#sorry to make everything about tyrion btw

[attonitos-gloria]

Thoughts on Larys Strong?

Ahhhh, friend. I adore him, and I feel very conflicted about it. Thank you for asking me that. I needed to vent about this.

I have to talk about Tyrion to explain why lol sorry I throw Tyrion in every conversation too. Also sorry to be HORRIBLY prolix, this is so long. (And spoilers for the books for those who care.)

I'm a simple girl, really. I see a cunning, clever, quiet, morally gray man moving the strings of the game, chances are that I'll like him a lot, and it's even better if he is a little sad; I think Tyrion being my favorite character is a reflection of that.

But Tyrion is a deconstruction of a certain trope - that is, the evil disabled advisor, who can not be trusted because they're ill-intentioned from go, they will inevitably betray and turn against the master they served, because they only serve their own interests... No. This is Tywin, and Otto, two very able-bodied men. But Tyrion is loyal to a fault to the Lannisters, even though they are horrible to him (he never bets against his family! Until the day he does!!) He is actually an excellent asset to them and works very, very hard for them. When he turns again them, he does it out of grief and not as a consummation of a long planned betrayal. It's sudden; it's utterly emotional. And it's not exactly a secret: it's loud, as most things Tyrion does. It's not behind the curtains! The betrayal of House Lannister against him was obvious, and his response to that was just as obvious. He killed Tywin and fled. That's the message. He has turned against the system and he wants it to ruin.

This is one of the reasons why I don't like the idea that Tyrion will (unexpectedly) betray Dany in the books; like, why bother to give this character so much nuance only to make him go down the same path of so many of the Disabled men occupying the role of Advisors before him? Everyone expects Tyrion to betray people, both in-universe and in fandom, even though he is, all things considered and relatively to other characters, a rather loyal man (as long as people are loyal to him). He is many horrible things! But unloyal is not one of them! I trust George; I think ADWD built things in a way that even if he does, indeed, end up betraying Dany, he was given enough nuance that we cannot put him in that category. It would make me very, very sad, I'm not going to lie to you. But I think characters, unlike real people, should be allowed to be evil, and Tyrion has so many reasons to be the worst person ever that whatever he does... We will get it. We are going to read it and be like, "oh, so this is one of the possible outcomes of years being abused and neglected by your family and the entire world! This is a thing a human being could do if they're deprived of love." That's the thing: Tyrion is a whole, entire, layered character. If he turns out to be, ultimately, a villain, we'll follow the thread, all the way from Joanna's womb, and indeed before her, to Tytos, to all the Lannisters before them that made his life and story what it is.

BUT LARYS. You asked me about Larys. Larys is such a perfect crystallization of this trope that it almost makes me cringe inside. Even in the books he is, like, this huge mystery. Why does Larys do the things he does? What is his game? No one knows, Larys is inscrutable. He's not morally gray; as far as we know he's straight up evil, but almost no one (but Alicent) seems to suspect it because he looks innocent, he looks harmless, keeping the company of women because he cannot hunt. He is deceitful: that's pretty much the core of his character. Intentionally misleading, and even more, using his disability to employ that falsehood. Behind that mask of being a loyal servant, he has manipulated basically everyone he's interacted so far, including Otto. He employs cruel methods, he is completely unscrupulous. He is ridiculously creepy and the show goes to great lengths to make that clear. He killed his family, and he showed no signs to hate them before, quite the contrary; he simply did it because... Love is a downfall! It's almost like the show is telling you that betrayal is in his nature [ableism red flag]. So obviously [spoiileeersss] he is going to betray Alicent after years in her service.

Oh, and also, people call him Larys Clubfoot, and he has a foot fetish....... like. Really? Why, WHY make him disabled, I ask?

And it's hard, because for one side, the mystery is part of the reason why he is such a fun character. Sometimes people are simply evil! Not every bad person has a traumatic family history; some people are just perverse. Larys seems to be one of those people; and why not? For the other side, when we deprive him of nuance and a history that could enlighten us as to how he became this horrible man....... He becomes a trope, and not the nicest one!!! Hence my conflict.

But at the end of the day, even though the way he is presented to us strings a problematic chord to me, I am obsessed with the portrayal Needham gave him. Obsessed. I read the terms and conditions, and I wish to proceed, I am so so sorry. I just support all his war crimes.

We still don't know why he did what he did to Alicent in the books, and I'm very curious to see how the show is going to explain or justify that. I think there's still time to be invested in Larys' character. I thought at some point in the first season that maybe they will go the Criston route? He is going to be disappointed because Alicent will reject him in some manner that will displease him, but he will do it in the delusional, creepy way, and not the incel-Cole way. Or maybe they'll just follow along and give him no reason whatsoever, because he is Larys? I don't know!!!

In the books, Larys asks to be buried without his twisted foot. When combined with the scene in the garden and the hunt, I think this throws an interesting light on his character. He's never found peace with his disability, he doesn't want to be tied to it for eternity beyond the grave; but he's found something useful - being invisible, looking harmless, observing people without being observed - and he turns this against the world. I like this villain origin story very much! I would like to see this being further explored.

I think they really grounded his character in Alicent, so far. His relationship with Alicent fascinates me, because it is so abusive. It's coded as courtly romance but it's ANYTHING but. This man is gaslighting her! He actually groomed her (politically if nothing else) when she was rather young and lonely! And she is using him! It's all horrible, and they remind me a lot of Petyr and Sansa in that regard, and I always hated the romanticization of Petyr/Sansa so I feel validated lol I mean. Let creepy ships be creepy.

Speaking of which, that's one of the reasons why I didn't hate the scene where they exchange information for sexual services. I liked it, because it was so horrible! Like, Alicent looks so uncomfortable that it was bordering on the non-consensual. You cannot romanticize that shit, lol (I mean, you can, but the romance is not there, that's my point). But the fact he has a foot fetish (and she takes her shoes off on her first dinner with him) reminded me of Shae calling Tyrion my giant and the court proceeding to ridicule him for it at his trial. I wish they hadn't done that to Larys. Nothing against kink. Nothing against finding sexual pleasure in what one perceives as a lack in one's life, be it a father or a mother, or a limb, or privacy; whatever! Kink is fine, and everyone does that. It can be empowering. But one of those days I would like to see disabled people in TV having different kinks? Or maybe... none? That would be nice, too, and I don't know what it is with making such a fuss about what disabled people like, or don't like, in the bedroom. Or maybe I do.

TL;DR: I think his characterization is problematic and I wish he were more nuanced. I still hope they will develop him further. But I cannot help but love him. Like. Top 3 favorite characters of HOTD for real.

I would really love to hear your thoughts on him.

[morp]

hello this is very random guy very random person never seen or been to this blog before. i would like to request a *checks notes* 🍌🍊🍇🍑🍎🍍🍌🍉🍈🍒 (there are two bananas in this ask game LMAOOO)

Hello very very random stranger i do not know. Your asks, as requested, behind a readmore because theres a lot. Enjoy, very random stranger

🍌Three headcanons about how magic works in your lore

Well i. Dont have too many magic headcanons im afraid. Uhhh

You can use too much of any given magic, and it can have disastrous effects on you or a whole Location

Magic residue! Is a thing! A particularly brutal elemental something can linger with a dragon for years or even their whole life. A super effective element will cause more pain and suffering and complications, obviously, and theoretically multiple elements together can leave their residues behind at once, which can make everything worse or better or both at the same time!

thats all i have, im sorry 😔

🍊A dragon you like based on looks

All of them. Obviously. But bear witness to the first project I ever had that I used a gem gene for, Morpho (she/her) <3

🍇A dragon you like based on personality

Observe my favorite doctor in my lore. Stuxnet (it/he/they), dragon turned not dragon after Forbidden Portal incident, it’s sketchy and generally unnerving and would probably murder you if you made too much eye contact but would also probably murder you if you made too LITTLE eye contact, kind of a “keep in your periphary vision” type beast. But hes also extremely trustworthy, you can trust him with your medical needs and they will deliver the best care they can give. A mostly well meaning little freak with only a touch of medical malpractice

🍑Show off an expensive regening project

Observe. Wildclaw gene and butterfly. Thank you notn 🙏 (they/them btw)

🍎Show off a Special-eyed dragon

Tyrion, my Necromancer (they/them). The skin clipping is unfortunate but works for them, the sword has eyes now

🍍Favorite (& second favorite, etc) Elemental Festival and your reasons why

Number one is PLAGUE!!! PLAGUE NUMERO UNO🦠🦠🦠🦠🦠🦠🦠🦠 I’m absolutely biased as a Germ myself but I Adore Riot of Rot, the apparel is almost always a banger and I always need 484847384 of em. I mean. Proto-wings anyone? Rotted mane???? Beloved

Second one uhhhh. Fire. Good orange stuff👍

🍌A dragon + their theme song

You get my Horizon Aspect lad, Lan (he/him), and this song :)

🍉Favorite dragon breed to draw

Snapper. Absolutely snapper. All the way snapper. Lmao

🍈A dragon you hate (/pos) based on personality/lore

DionaeaMuscipula (she/her). She did unhatched egg experiments in the Seedscar. How dare you do that. How dare you leave a perfectly good baby with trauma and some very bad Arcane and Nature residue and then fuck off to avoid the criminal repurcussions of this actual crime

🍒Show off a fodder rescue

Iota (they/them). Another Necromancer, I sniped em during a push and originally intended to exalt them. Then I got attached. I love them very much

[melrosing]

Anon from yesterday 👋. Sorry irl stuff got in the way. I'm not super well versed in your content but so far I do think you talk about her in a way that isn't "Cersei is an evil bitch just because" and i deff said as much in my first ask. I also fully understand the internalized misogyny in a mother not liking her daughters as much as her sons and that's where you were going with for Joanna. What I noticed when i saw your AU was that BOTH Joanna (her thoughts/feelings) and the AU itself (themes etc) are more outwardly negative and less symphatetic towards her than the others.

And IT'S SO HARD FOR ME TO EXPLAIN THIS VIA ASK BOX but i am basically going to reemphasize what I said before and also say that i think there is a bias for imagining AUs that put cersei in a more negative (and less…idk kinder? gentler? considerate?) light than her brothers whether it's one dimensional or complex and I noticed that in your AU as well, as if she was always doomed to have a dark cloud over her head while her brothers got even a tiny bit of shine and light. I can provide examples if you wish to continue the convo. Anyways I don't mean to overstay my welcome so i'll just leave this as a case of us having very similar ideals but different ways of interpreting them. And btw that other anon was dead ass wrong about what they said about me. Like I promise I don't see her as a sweet angel victim and ignore how ugly and fucked up she is (esp the book version). I am genuinely SO sorry this ask got as long as it did.

no worries, I'm happy to discuss! but honestly, I'm kind of at a loss with what choices I made in this particular AU led you to ask whether I even liked Cersei as a character.

the whole thing (at least where concerns Jaime and Cersei) is based on the conjecture of what might happen to the relationships between the twins and their mother if she had gone ahead and shipped Cersei to Dorne - which, had Joanna survived, I think is highly likely to have happened, i.e. it was on the verge of becoming a canon event. and I think it only makes sense to conclude that Joanna and Cersei's relationship would take a semi-catastrophic hit if it did. like, that is a very heavy thing to do to a seven-year-old, and Cersei has always had a keen sense of injustice and sure can harbour a grudge, so I think she'd take it especially hard.

then of course the misogynistic motherhood is just something that I thought made Joanna's relationship with both Jaime and Cersei more interesting, because it means she can't truly see either of them clearly. in my mind it just makes sense for a Lannister, certainly for the wife of Tywin, and what we know of Joanna makes me feel she had some level of reverence of patriarchal structures. so, threw that in.

and also tbh, it's just more interesting to me than the notion that all the dead ladies of asoiaf would've been these girlboss mums teaching their girls to be lovely ladies or feisty villainesses, like it's just.... so boring to me lmao. like one thing with Catelyn (who I do adore) is that I kind of wish GRRM would go harder on her relationship with Arya. sounds like there's some tension there, old man. well, bust it open!!

so there's my reasoning: I picture Joanna as a deeply flawed mother who, in a moment of both protectiveness and prejudice against her daughter effectively exiles a seven-year-old who won't forgive her for it, and everything else spins from there.

and I guess I just feel like we're splitting hairs a bit here because I don't think I've produced anything that much happier in the AU for Jaime or Tyrion?? like I said of Jaime that he essentially has a distant relationship w his mother for the rest of her life, gets hitched to Lysa in an entirely loveless marriage, and lives probably a quite unfulfilling adulthood. Tyrion in the meantime.... I mean basically all I've given Tyrion is a different kind of abusive relationship with a parent lmao, and a life of isolation and toxic companionship. again, I think it'd be boring to have Joanna purely adore Tyrion or utterly despise him, so why not both.

and idk. I don't think either of the above is me gifting the Lannister boys something I'm refusing Cersei? like sure you could take it that way, but I suppose I'm just surprised that this disparity has struck you so much so that you think I must dislike Cersei to have even written it. you're welcome to provide examples if you like, bc honestly I figured it must be something substantially more than this AU that led you to send me the message - which is why I asked if you had some familiarity with the rest of my Cers posts, I assumed you must've read more than just this AU to make you ask that??

[fedonciadale]

How did your mind escaped POV trap from books? I mean, you mentioned it many time, like about that Daenerys is shown only with EVIL GUYS™ without depth and thats why she looks so sympathetic to reader. Or Sansa through eyes of Arya, where she really feels like empty shallow rich girl. I'm asking because thanks to YOU I noticed it. This traps, I mean. Really. I was Dany stan, that gone to anti-dany blogs to check why all of you hate her so much. Well, understand now. (1/3)

I mean, as you said earlier, many of Dany stans were catched into trap because of her hard upbringing and constant abuse from her brother (yeah, me too). And how we turn a blindside to all of her wrongdoings, because of said traps. I first watched the show, where all seasons showed how she is so nice, cute, if sometimes brash. I wanted her to be the Queen. And now I see what are you talking about. To be real, I feel now like I lost a friend. It's awful, but I prefer this (1½/2)

(2/2) delusional. Sorry for rant, but I'm feelin' uneasy for last few weeks. Dany was my favourite heroine of all times, and now...😢

Hi there!

Thanks for coming into my inbox! I am very happy that you reach out! I think it is fantastic that you looked up our theories and thought about it.

First of all, you are not alone in falling into the PoV trap. I did as well and I tell you why and how I untangled myself from it. Many books especially light fantasy books (and even others) do not work with the PoV trap. They just expect you to like the hero/heroine and follow them whatever they do. Take HP for example. By the seventh book Harry who is the hero of the book does a lot of questionable things (like casting unforgivable curses) and nothing of it is ever addressed. In the context of his last stand against Voldemoart it is all understandable and even forgivable, but nothing suggest that the author even wants you to question Harry’s actions. We are just supposed to root for him no matter what. So, I guess, we are not really accustomed to read with detailed judgement.

More under the cut...

I remember I once read a book by Kristen Britain, the Green Rider series, pretty traditional fantasy, and the fact that the enemies tortured the heroes was a major plot point. And half a book later they captured an enemy and began to torture him and I was like “What the fuck, you’re supposed to be the good guys!”. But it was never addressed and I think it was just one of those cases where the double standards for protagonists and antagonists were just taken for granted - which is lazy storytelling but I digress.

Now, I think we can agree that GRRM is not someone who takes his readers by the hand and explains everything. You have to be really alert while you read, to get all the hints. Even if you skip over the foreshadowing and everything you have to make a puzzle from the information you get from different PoVs. Nothing is just handed to you. Nowhere does GRRM say: BTW, Lysa Arryn is the one who killed Jon Arryn. So, he sort of trains his readers to read between the lines. But you can still read everything and not delve into it and let yourself be surprised by the twists and turns. You don’t need to think about every sentence to enjoy the books.

In a way this manner of writing is also the case for the PoV trap. GRRM wants his readers to form their own opinion, but it took me actually really long to get that he actually wants me to question the actions of the PoV characters.

When I first read AGOT I sort of fell into the PoV trap. I routed for Dany, I enjoyed Tyrion’s witticism, I thought Sansa was a brat etc. etc.

I remember quite vividly, when I began to dislike Dany - and I must stress that this was not the moment I noticed the PoV trap:

"Most of Ogo's riders fled," Ser Jorah was saying. "Still, there may be as many as ten thousand captives."         

Slaves, Dany thought. Khal Drogo would drive them downriver to one of the towns on Slaver's Bay. She wanted to cry, but she told herself that she must be strong. This is war, this is what it looks like, this is the price of the Iron Throne.    (AGOT, Daenerys VII)

I remember, that I thought something along the lines of: “Well, Dany, it’s your fault these people are enslaved, you want the throne. Maybe you should have thought about that earlier.”

This was the moment I began to dislike her, but I still thought that she was obviously the heroine. Because the last lines of the book was this:

As Daenerys Targaryen rose to her feet, her black hissed, pale smoke venting from its mouth and nostrils. The other two pulled away from her breasts and added their voices to the call, translucent wings unfolding and stirring the air, and for the first time in hundreds of years, the night came alive with the music of dragons.     (AGOT, Dany X)

So, I thought: well, I don’t like her but it was not the first time that I did not like someone who was the protagonist of a book. It happens, and I usually brush over it, concentrating on the people I like.

In the second book I started to like Sansa. She won me over when she was so brave during the Battle of the Blackwater and from that moment I rooted for her although I feared that she was not important enough (you know, no sword and so son).

In the second book I got doubts about Tyrion, but I only began to dislike him in ASOS, when he killed Symon the singer for making eyes at Shae (and had him put into soup, yikes and double yikes).

And I still thought: O.k. Dany, Tyrion these are the main PoVs, certainly they will be important in bringing down the ice threat. Not once did I think that I was meant to realize their dubious actions. I thought it was all about them being a key in the destruction of the Others even if they were grey characters,

So I was still not onto the fact that the PoV trap was a thing....

At the end of ASOS I discovered some ASOIAF discussions and I came across the three dragonriders theory, Dany, Tyrion, Jon and Jonerys as endgame and I believed it all. I just believed it because this is how fantasy usually goes? Humanity against the evil menacing Others.

I did not like it very much though, not at all and I suppose the part of me that did not like it always was looking for other solutions.

When I read AFFC and ADWD I had sort of reluctantly accepted that I might not like the ending but I still read the books, because I wanted to see my favs and how they fared. I would accept Jonerys and the three dragonriders if my Starklings would just survive.

And then the show came out. I still didn’t like Dany, and some of her scenes made me cringe the Mhysa scene, that screams hubris and white saviour), but I still thought that she might be the hero. It was only during and after season 6 that I desperately looked for answers and chanced upon the idea that Jon and Sansa might be important and that Dany might be an antagonist. And it was only then that it clicked for me. I read the Meerenese blot and all that and I finally understood that there was a reason why I was uneasy when reading Dany’s chapters, a real reason, not just me being overly picky or just too morally sensitive to root for the heroes.

It was only then, that I realized the PoV trap for what it is - a clever way to make you root for a character and prepare the rug pull. As you can see it was a rather long journey for me!

And Dany wasn’t my hero, so how difficult must it be for someone who liked her. And to be quite honest with you, the show didn’t make it exactly easy to accept Dany’s turn, because although they did it, it could have been done much better!

And once it had clicked, there is no way back. Once you have understood something you cannot unsee that. So, if you feel like you lost a friend that is understandable.

It might be only a little consolation: This is what GRRM wants his readers to feel. The rug pull that happens once you realize you rooted for a tyrant. The doubt about your own ability to judge a person. The disappointment that a person you liked has misused your trust (in a way). You’re angry at Dany, really angry. You might be angry at GRRM that he duped you so well. That he knew how to get you, the bloody bastard.

So, I actually think it is o.k. to be flummoxed about the fact that can see that now. As if a veil was torn from your eyes, maybe. I think this is an important discovery: that we can be duped. That someone who uses nice words and apparently wants to make the world better can dupe us into believing them. It happens in real life and our only weapon against that is to be critical. To look closely, to think, and most of all to question ourselves.

Thanks for your ask! I was very moved that you came into my askbox for this!

[aboveallarescuer]

Btw, I wonder if you ever thought about the Jaime/Cersei and Dany/Daario relationships paralleling eachother? I never see people talking about it but some of their quotes and scenes seem intentionally similar to me. + For example, how Daario and Jaime's (yes, Jaime Lannister is a toxic romantic partner, the fandom can stay mad) reaction to their respective marriage proposals are heavily linked with posession (more so than love).

First of all, Anon, I'm assuming you're the same person who sent me two asks, this one and another about Tyrion. Re: the latter ask, I basically agree with your comments and have nothing substantial to add, so I'm going to focus on answering this one.

So, yes, I had thought about similarities between Dany/Daario and Cersei/Jaime before, but I'm glad you sent me this ask because you made me think of more parallels and antiparallels. They are certainly worth discussing because they highlight different aspects of Dany's and Cersei's characters and make it clear, once again, that they are meant to be foils.

(I'm not going to add book quotes here because I'm tired, sorry... But you can ask for evidence in another ask if you find anything I say questionable)

Daario and Jaime are both hot-headed, arrogant warriors presented as alternatives to the husbands of the two queens (Hizdahr, Robert).

Both Dany and Cersei love these men instead of their husbands.

Both Daario and Jaime react angrily when they find out that Dany and Cersei are going to marry.

Both Daario and Jaime ask the queens to leave their husbands and to be with them instead, but they both deny their requests.

Both Daario and Jaime offer to kill their queens' husbands for them. Both Dany and Cersei imagine the two men following through with their threats at some point.

Dany ends her affair with Daario after she takes Hizdahr as her consort. Cersei doesn't end her affair with Jaime after marrying Robert (and she did nothing wrong in this particular situation).

Neither Dany nor Cersei hides their affairs well (though it's worth noting that Cersei is being more reckless in doing so because she was queen consort and her power derived from Robert, while Dany was queen regnant and, therefore, had power in her own right. Indeed, Dany taking Daario as her lover is compared to Lewyn Martell, a man, taking a paramour in Dorne. That certainly isn't how the Faith views Cersei's affair with Jaime. Also, as I said above, Dany's affair lasted while she was unmarried, while Cersei's happened while she was married).

Dany thinks she'll never have a child with Hizdahr because she believes she's infertile. Cersei thought she'd never have a child with Robert back when he was alive because she always took measures to prevent that from ever happening (and she definitely did nothing wrong here).

Dany idealizes her relationship with Daario way more than Cersei idealizes hers with Jaime. For instance, Dany says to herself that she would give up her crown for Daario if he ever asked her to do so, but she doubts he ever would because she assumes he loves her solely because of her power. Cersei never considers giving up her crown for Jaime (to be fair, I don't think Dany would've done that for Daario either). In this particular case, I actually think that Rhaegar is Cersei's Daario, because it's with Rhaegar that Cersei dreamed and still dreams of marrying and having his children and living a blissful life together (though, even in that fantasy, Cersei would still want to be queen, while Dany thinks she'd be content living a normal life alongside the man she loves without any power or luxury in the house with the red door). Daario and Rhaegar (rather than Jaime) are the men who bring out Dany's and Cersei's romantic sides (which makes sense because Cersei idealized Rhaegar back when she was a young girl like Dany). Rhaegar is the one that got away for Cersei, and I imagine Dany will have similar feelings about Daario in the future.

At some point during their reigns, both Dany and Cersei send Daario and Jaime away, but for opposite reasons: Dany does so because Daario advised her to kill her subjects and she's appaled by the suggestion; Cersei does so because Jaime advised her to cooperate with her subjects and she assumes that that means he is disrespecting her authority (which he does sometimes, but not always).

It's harder for Dany to be apart from Daario than it is for Cersei to be apart from Jaime. Dany immediately regrets her decision to send him away and even goes as far as to think that, because she had an indirect role in Hazzea's death for allowing Drogon to roam freely, she is a monster just like Daario (seriously, how can anyone think that book!Dany is arrogant???). Meanwhile, Cersei only comes to regret her decision to send Jaime away after she needs his help, specifically after the Faith arrests her and she has no reliable option to choose to fight for her life in a trial by combat.

Both Dany and Cersei spend most of their storylines away from these men. (I could be wrong, but I don't think GRRM had Daario out of the picture because he was supposedly bored with him like I've seen some BNFs or 'neutrals' argue... I do think that was a choice specifically made to strengthen the parallels between Dany and Cersei).

Both Daario and Jaime feel jealous of Dany's and Cersei's relationships with other men throughout AFFC/ADWD.

Daario returns with the Stormcrows when Dany recalls him even though it would have been beneficial to betray her and turn to Yunkai's side, especially since he already knew that the Second Sons had done that. Jaime doesn't return when Cersei asks him to go back... You could even say that he switches sides, in a way, by deciding to prioritize Brienne's request instead. This is part of a larger pattern: while most of Dany's people (including Daario) remain loyal to her by the end, almost all of Cersei's allies abandon her. While it's said that Dany managed to keep everyone (former slaves and former masters) together, Cersei destroyed the Lannister-Tyrell alliance due to her poor decisions.

ADWD Daenerys X ends with Dany thinking about how Daario wouldn't mind seeing her in such a messy state like how she is by the end of the chapter. AFFC Cersei X ends with Cersei hoping against hope that Jaime will return and win her trial by combat. Both expect to be reunited with and to be saved by their lovers at the end of these chapters.

Dany doesn't trust Daario, but she doesn't close herself off from him either, which is why she has the support of the Stormcrows. Cersei says she lost her trust in Jaime, but then, by the end, she is in such a dire situation that she desperately decides to put all her hope in him and trust him way too much (to a degree that even Qyburn finds concerning since he lost his hand). This is part of a larger pattern: while Dany is wary of some people, she knows that she should still take risks and make alliances. This attitude doesn't make her omniscient and she is not immune to making mistakes or to people (like Brown Ben) betraying her, sure. That being said, Dany still remains open-minded, cooperates with influential allies and makes a peace agreement that could have worked if the deal wasn't inherently false for prioritizing the privileges of the masters over the lives of the slaves and if her primary goal wasn't to protect the disenfranchised first and foremost. Meanwhile, Cersei thinks she should distrust everyone, which leads her to alienate potential allies that could have been useful and to be surrounded by people who claim to agree with her on everything, but who are neither experienced nor reliable. Then she creates plans that rely way too much on these very untrustworthy people, which is why they backfire: from the construction of the dromonds (which she relied on Aurane Waters, who turned his back on her) to the attempt on Bronn's life (which she relied on Balman Byrch, who turned his back on her) to the scheme to have Margaery and her cousins arrested (which she relied on Osney Kettleblack, who turned his back on her) to the decision to rearm the Faith Militant (which she relied on the High Sparrow, who turned his back on her) to her decision to trust that Jaime (who also turned his back on her) will return to fight for her life ... I'm sure there are more examples, but that's enough to illustrate my point. Cersei's thinking is too extreme, while Dany has a healthy distrust of others. As a result, Cersei makes hasty decisions and burns bridges unnecessarily, while Dany is able to make more carefully weighed decisions, as well as to create and maintain important alliances.

Finally, I think Dany and Daario's relationship is more positive than Cersei and Jaime's. Not only there's no verbal abuse or disrespect of sexual consent like how it happens with Cersei/Jaime, but Daario didn't switch sides to Yunkai, gave her good counsel (such as when he tells her to hold court and reminds her that her children need her) and genuinely cares about Dany, which we see from when he tells her not to get married time and again to when we contrast him with Osney. He is possessive and brags about sleeping with her on some occasions, yes, but I think it was @evilwomen who pointed out in one of our conversations that Dany doesn't feel bothered by any of that, which goes to show how much she loves him, since she's willing to forgive actions that would be considered insults for his sake.

So, once again, thanks for this ask, Anon, it encouraged me to think about connections that I hadn't considered before.

And you know, I said this before and will say it again... This is why I think Dany is the YMBQ... Not just because she clearly fits all the requirements, but because she and Cersei were way too carefully written to parallel and contrast each other (so much so that the author mentioned that in multiple interviews). You said you "never see people talking about" the parallels between Cersei/Jaime and Dany/Daario, but look at how much I managed to find off the top of my head (and I'm not even sure this is comprehensive, tbqh)??? Now imagine that happening to all of their casts of supporting characters and to all the political events and to pretty much every single aspect of their characterizations and storylines. Their parallels and antiparallels are really overwhelming, and it's why I decided to make gifs showing why they're foils.

[wolfsneedles]

when cersei says, "she had a warrior heart, but the gods in their blind malice had given her the feeble body of a woman"

i actually felt it. no not the way she does ofc since she is essentially an antagonistic character but more like, the comparisons she makes the way she hates her own sex and wants power how she assumes herself as tywins daughter and how jaime thinks she call herself tywin lannister with teats, all point to her major disgusting internal conflict. ofc when we later see walk of shame it was worse the comments thrown on her body. in first books when we never had her pov i thought she too would admire herself her beauty, however cersei, in all her honestly hates her female traits and doesn't flaunt her beauty like i always thought or got idea from in first books. she is very mean and dehumanising to women and sees them inferiorly, not to say she herself was treated with a lot of hatred and sexism and then sold to marry a man she doesn't desire who himself was brutal on her, however i think she would have never been personally happy with anyone. cersei sees the entire point of being woman to please men with what she tells sansa, and then to be used as woman too . she doesn't like or meets appreciates strong women she hasn't seen or met dany obv neither would she ever have pleasant thoughts about brienne and arya even, she comments sometimes how woman is pretty but she herself always reduces her worth and others to just a girl to be sold and mounted. ofc her internal conflict i find is v interesting and confusing at times. she hates women but also wants other to accept her everything her every cruel practices even perhaps as woman. she doesn't like being woman to please people at all, yet its so sad and helpless to see her try to tempt jaime or osney even later just so they could listen to her. she hates the rampant sexism and misogyny in westeros even exhibited by her brothers and father but she doesn't realise she is using the same notion and definitions of sexism people have about women to demean and hate woman around her. its like she hates men definitely but she hates doing effort herself too to be a same female figure or woman we see other asoiaf women exhibit or do.

i was wondering if her behaviour towards women themselves, how she sees them inferior even when the men around her aren't seeing them like this, but she sees women with sexist approach too she mentions about rape or septa being or longing for rape, she ridicules and discusses margaerys virginity so much, she talks about uncensored stuff to sansa lol, when she is young girl literally, points to the fact how blunt and hateful cersei is of herself but also of female definition. i think this has a lot to do with her maybe not having to experience a mothers love??? i never liked how she was always surrounded ironically by men around her. we never see major strong female lannister representation i just realised. we only see or hear about tywin who had brutal approach to westeros the, holier-than-thou approach. we see jaime who is prob not worse like tywin at all but he also constantly tries to berate and pass quite nauseating remarks for women and ill hold this opinion about him until i see him say sorry to brienne lol (not to mention he does not hate women as whole even as being a man), we see tyrion also not really ideal partner and excessively morally grey character although i have never or maybe remember sexist or extremely insensitive remarks about women by tyrion until we see him in adwd only blurting out pretty worse sentences and maybe acting same like his father, and then we just know kevan who always well * saw cersei as not so perfect person and is kind of weird to her or idk maybe i never liked that lad because he also kind of sexualised her in childhood as cersei says maybe that men never looked at her like they do at others and she was seen with different eyes, all this time i wonder kind of where was tywin though he could have given or taught her good wholehearted valuable values anyway my anti tywin agenda not here today*, and then we see lancel, well for all we know he slept with her too but its just weird again that she slept with him to get rid of her obnoxious husband and well, lancel doesn't really hurt her though or ever saw her like her brothers do, considering his religious changes. but all this time im wondering cersei kind of missed having any wholesome woman in her life as, friend or companion which contributes to her internalised misogyny even more (its like she is opposite of catelyn hundred percent but cat also has internalised misogyny and i realised she never had loving sister cousin friend or companion) maybe im not thinking right but doesn't it click to u all that they both esp cersei of course see women in diff colours and not like how arya dany sansa brienne see women, because they lacked any stronger female character to look upto too. cats treatment of jon which is separate thing was quite questionable and so how she feels weird too when she sees mya stone! but cat or cersei never both, confronted their husbands or told them anything or even discussed any issues with them (this is for cat esp when she should have been angry over ned for jon :/ but she changed her energy to jon) . and it makes me wonder its also because they both were raised in a v male dominated society with diff kinds of fathers, uncles and brothers, that cersei especially has diff notion to what a random woman outside castle would even look like or act like and that all of them aren't really linked to their virginity or marriages and babies. i dont think ofc she would have been different if she had wholesome female friend but she did or should have had someone as girl who had her back when she was growing up???

(btw this isn't pro cersei thing at all - i was kind of horrified by her analysis of women we get to see in affc and then the melara thing at her young age was well fked up also pinching tyrion when he was baby "until he cried" or calling him "little monster" or whatever shows infact how she is quite disdainful of men like tyrion too and not just women. i was wondering maybe her losing joanna maybe played significant role only that being said, she is biggest antiparallel to dany and catelyn! )

[rainhadaenerys]

Post season 8 fix-it headcanon/Jonerys fanfic outline

For Daenerys Resurrection Week, Day 1: Resurrection and forgiveness

A long time ago I commented here that I had written an outline for a post season 8 fix-it fanfic. And I did write some things, mostly about the political situation in the story, and character's motivations. As far as actually coming up with a proper story and proper scenes though, I didn't really go very far. And to be honest I really don't feel like writing fics, I'd rather spend my energy on metas. But I wanted to share my headcanon anyway.

To start, my headcanon is canon-compliant. I appreciate fix-it AUs, but I have a problem with them because I always feel the need to acknowledge canon. So I acknowledge everything that happened in season 8. But in my headcanon, I completely absolve Dany of everything. Instead, I tend to think Bran warged into Dany and made her burn King's Landing, urged by Sansa. So yeah, this is not for Stark fans. My headcanon is pretty much anti everyone but Dany and Jon. (By the way, if anyone has seen any fic with this premise, and that follows season 8 canon, can you please tell me? I don't know why, but it seems no one has thought of this so far? Or maybe I just haven't seen it, since I don't read a lot of fanfic, but I would appreciate reading a fic like this)

Ok, but now you're probably thinking, but why would Bran do this? Why would Sansa tell him to do this? Isn't it OOC? That's where my complete reinterpretation of Bran and Sansa's characters start. I'm sorry I had to vilify them, but I see no other way to completely absolve Dany.

First, Bran: When Bran had met Bloodraven, Bloodraven had hoped that by teaching Bran his abilities, he would have someone to help him look into the past and find an easier way to defeat the Night King. Probably, the children of the forest told him about something (like, maybe, some hidden magical artifact), but they didn’t know where this magical artifact was. So Bloodraven thought having another person with the Three Eyed Raven’s powers would help defeat the Night King. Bran followed Bloodraven’s instructions faithfully, but in the end, he didn’t find anything that would help, and that’s why he was useless in the War for the Dawn. The reason why the Night King was going after Bran was because the Night King knew Bran had the powers to find out his secret and destroy him easily (ie, without a battle). But Bran wasn’t able to do this in the end.

But Bran’s journey to become the three eyed raven wasn’t meaningless to the story. As Jojen once warned Bran, if he spent too much time inside the mind of a wolf, he would lose himself. And this is what happened. Bran spent most of his time warging on ravens, wolves, trees, trying to find the answer. He had seen in his future visions that the Night King would be defeated, so he wasn’t much worried about that (which explains his calm behavior when the Night King came to kill him), but he didn’t know exactly how, he thought he would be the one to do it, so he worked tirelessly and warged tirelessly (btw, Bran’s future visions are more flawed. He can look into the past easily if he knows what to look for, but the future isn’t as clear and it changes constantly, it is based on possibilities). Bloodraven had time to adapt before he spent most of his time warging. Bran didn’t have that time, because the need was urgent, so the time spent warging animals and trees made him start losing his humanity, in the sense that he stopped caring, and stopped having as much empathy. He loved his family to some extent, and he still had some sense of self preservation, but he had almost no empathy left for others.

Now, let's talk about Sansa. Sansa, during her journey, became a hardened woman. Unlike book Sansa, who keeps her kindness, show!Sansa has absorbed the lessons her abusers taught her: don’t trust anyone, look out only for yourself, take any advantage you can manage. This is what Sansa has been doing for quite some time. She doesn’t tell the truth about who killed Lysa Arryn, and the reason for this isn’t that she’s afraid of Littlefinger and sees no other choice. No. Sansa has entirely embraced Littlefinger and his plans. She later resents him for selling her to the Boltons, but this experience just leaves her more traumatized. So Sansa becomes a different person: her trauma makes her look out only for herself. She had always wished for power (since season 1 she wanted to be queen), and this hasn't changed, but now, it's also tied with her traumas: she wants power as a way for her to feel in control after lacking agency for so long.

So here's how I would interpret Sansa's actions since she escaped the Boltons. In season 6, when Littlefinger reminds Sansa that Jon is a threat to her, and only her half brother, Sansa starts plotting against him. She secretly corresponds with Littlefinger, and doesn’t tell Jon about the Vale army. She does this for different reasons: she thought that by doing this, Jon and Rickon had more chance to die, and she could become queen without Jon there to threaten her power. She also wanted to be seen as the hero of the battle, the one that saved them at the last minute, so she could have more chances of becoming queen. Not only that, but she didn’t want the Wildlings in the North and saw them as expendable. They were only a tool to her. She wanted to use them to get her lands and titles back, and used the fact that Jon saved them to try to convince Jon that they should fight (Sansa does say in season 6 that the Wildlings should fight for Winterfell because they owe Jon their lives). So she saw them as expendable tools to get Winterfell back, but she also didn’t care that they would die because she withheld information about the Vale army: the less foreign savages in the North, the better. When she doesn’t get her position of Queen in the North, she starts undermining Jon deliberately. Jon asks her to stop, but she continues doing it. When Bran returns, she offers Bran the position of Lord of Winterfell, and is relieved that he doesn’t want it. When the lords talk about putting her in Jon’s place, she doesn’t reprimand them. In her conflict with Arya, she was indeed going to kill Arya. After all, she sends Brienne away after Littlefinger reminds her that Brienne is sworn to protect both her and Arya. She only doesn’t kill Arya because she goes to Bran and learns that Littlefinger was manipulating her, and she realizes that Littlefinger is a bigger threat than Arya. She was fine in keeping Littlefinger as an ally before, she didn’t care about all the horrible things he did, but she realizes that keeping him alive would be more dangerous than advantageous. So she makes a sham trial to kill him, while also omitting her involvement in Littlefinger’s schemes in the Vale and the fact that she knew about them.

So by the time Dany gets to Winterfell, Sansa is a person that only cares about her position and privileges. When she hears Dany talking about her reforms in favor of the smallfolk, she is scandalized. Unlike book!Sansa, show!Sansa never lived as a bastard, and keeps her classism. Sansa is against Dany not because of pettiness or stupid distrust, but because she feels her power threatened, and because she thinks Dany is a tyrant for wanting to take away the privileges of the nobility. So Sansa tries to undermine Dany in every way she can: publicly telling Dany that she and her armies aren’t welcome; badmouthing Dany while Dany is fighting for her. When Sansa sees Dany giving Storm’s End to Gendry, she hates seeing it because she thinks giving Storm’s End to a bastard is an absurd (after all, she was usurped by her bastard brother) and also because if the Northern Lords see Dany’s generosity, they might not be so against her, especially after Dany fought for them. Finally, Sansa betrays the oath she swore to Jon in the godswood, telling Tyrion Jon’s secret, not necessarily because she wants Jon to be king, but because she wants to overthrow Dany. And she knows that if her plans succeeds, Dany will end up dead and no longer a threat. She doesn’t care that this could spark a civil war and that innocents could die. She doesn't care that she's plotting the death of a woman that just saved her. She only wants to retain her power, and she wouldn’t be allowed to do that if Dany actually “broke the wheel”. She continues not to care about anyone but herself by humiliating Edmure when he speaks (because she wants herself to be queen), and when Tyrion suggests Bran, she undermines him as well: first saying that Bran can’t rule because he doesn’t want it and can’t have children, and later by asking for independence, knowing that asking for independence would just lead to political instability and possibly war, but not caring about it, because she wants to be queen. So these are Sansa’s motivations.

So how would the idea of Bran warging into Dany work? Well, Bran has future visions. He doesn't choose to have them, they happen to him, and they are uncertain. But as we did see twice, Bran saw a dragon flying over King's Landing, and he saw the throne room destroyed. He later tells people in the Dragonpit that he knew he was going to be king. This implies that he didn't just have a vision of a dragon over King's Landing, but that he also had more detailed visions of what would happen later. He also tells Jon that Jon was "exactly where he has supposed to be", which implies that he knew Jon would kill Dany. So Bran knew many things: knew a dragon would fly over King's Landing, knew the throne room would be destroyed, knew Jon would kill Dany (meaning that he probably knew Dany was going to be responsible for the destruction), and knew the political ramifications of all that (he was going to be king). I think that, despite the fact his visions of the future are not as exact as visions of the past and present, every evidence seems to point out that Bran knew Dany would destroy King's Landing. So I choose to believe that he saw Dany, at the back of a dragon, burning everything, and all the subsequent events that happened with it.

So maybe, Bran started looking into the future and saw Dany becoming more and more depressed. He thought this would make her burn King's Landing. And he has seen how much Sansa craves power, and he still has some loyalty to his family. So he really has no interest in preventing an outcome that gets his family on top, and given that he has lost much of his empathy due to too much time warging on animais and trees, he doesn't really try to do anything to prevent the burning of King's Landing. He doesn't warn Dany or Jon. He tells Jon the truth about his parentage even though he knows that the truth would cause chaos. And so on.

At some point, he tells Sansa what's going to happen. And Sansa also does nothing to prevent it, and instead, wants to make it happen (like when she tells the truth of Jon's parentage). She takes Bran's visions of Dany burning King's Landing as a confirmation of her bias against Dany, which makes her feel righteous in her actions. And she wants House Stark on top, so she doesn't really stop to think that maybe, just maybe, she should be trying to prevent this from happening.

So when Dany marchs south, and attacks King's Landing, Bran watches over things to see what's happening, and Sansa waits by his side for him to tell her the news. But as time passes, nothing happens. Dany is not burning King's Landing as they expected. She is only attacking the soldiers, and is close to winning without bloodshed (This did, in fact, happen in the show. Dany never attacks any civilians before the bells, she only attacks military targets). Sansa starts to get anxious. Sansa was already expecting that she would become queen, and she becomes nervous when this possibility starts to be threatened. Then, when King's Landing surrenders, Sansa gets more desperate, and asks Bran to do something, telling him that they shouldn't allow Dany to stay in power. Bran, dispassionate as he is about everything and not really caring about people, tells Sansa that the possibility of warging into Dany exists. Sansa asks Bran to do it. He asks if she is certain, and in the desperation of the moment, Sansa says yes. So for Sansa, this was about seeing the power that she craved slipping through her fingers once again. For Bran, he was simply doing what Sansa wanted. He didn't particularly care about becoming King, but he didn't really have much empathy for the people of King's Landing, so to him it didn't matter.

Dany doesn't really realize what's happening. She is in a very emotionally fragile state, and she is already feeling certain things like anger and despair. This makes her vulnerable to Bran. A person with the mental strength to resist Bran’s warging could have done it, but Dany couldn't. So when we see Dany shaking her head in episode 8x5, before she starts burning King's Landing, it's because she was fighting against Bran's invasion, but in the end she couldn't resist it. So everything we see from that moment in episode 8x5 until Dany's death, Dany is only vaguely aware of the things she is doing, but is actually being controlled by Bran. And Bran is doing everything to make sure the outcome Sansa desired (Dany's death) happens: after Dany's attack, Bran makes her land with Drogon and makes her give Grey Worm the order to kill the Lannister soldiers that surrendered. He makes the speech about world domination. And Bran's warging is also the explanation why Dany acted so weird in the last episode. It's also the reason Dany didn't have anyone to protect her when Jon came to kill her: Bran made her give orders to her soldiers to leave her alone, and to let Jon come in without taking his weapons. When Jon stabs Dany, it's when Bran finally leaves her mind, and it's the first moment of full awareness she has since Bran warged her. So the betrayal and heartbreak she feels is even worse. She wakes from a trance and sees the man she loves killing her.

Now, you might wonder, why did Bran and Sansa have to go to such extreme lengths? Why didn't they warg a random soldier to do the job and kill Dany, instead of making her burn thousands of innocents to make Jon kill her? Expecting that Jon would make the decision to kill Dany is risky, because he could decide not to do it, and Bran and Sansa's plan would fall apart. But the problem is: they didn't simply want Dany to die. They wanted to destroy her reputation, to make sure that none of her followers could seize power. If Dany simply died, the throne would go to Jon, and measures to break the wheel could still happen. Sansa didn't want this to happen, she didn’t want to lose her privileges, she wanted the herself in power and Dany's forces neutralized. By warging into Dany, they could destroy Dany's reputation, make Tyrion and Jon kill her and destroy their own chances of seizing power, and destroy the chance that Dany's allies could seize power instead of her. With Dany burning King's Landing, Bran and Sansa could spin the narrative that Dany is a radical extremist, and that her wish to make reforms is what made her a tyrant. And so on. So this is why none of them thought of warging someone and making them kill Dany, or warging Dany and making her kill herself. (Besides, I headcanon that warging someone is easier if the person is in a fragile mental state, so maybe trying to warg someone else wouldn't work).

So this is my headcanon to explain Dany burning King's Landing. From this point, everything happens as in the show: Bran and Sansa get their crowns, Arya sails west of Westeros (and dies in a storm because I have no creativity to think of a story for her and I started to hate her show self anyway), Tyrion becomes Hand and Jon is exiled. Drogon obviously, takes Dany to Volantis to resurrect her.

In exile, Jon is miserable. On the one hand, he tells himself he did the right thing. After all, Dany seemed intent on "liberating" more cities, and could maybe kill his family. And regardless of whether she would burn more cities or not, or kill his family or not, he thinks that anyone who would burn innocents for no reason and call it "necessary" shouldn't rule.

On the other hand, Jon blames himself for all the ways he failed Dany. He thinks that he was so caught up in his own angst about his parentage, about how he and Dany were related, that he didn't notice how much she was hurting. So while Jon tells himself he did the right thing in killing her, he also blames himself for not comforting her, for disregarding her fears about the dangers of his parentage coming out and telling the secret to his family, for not standing up more for her. He wonders if he only could have comforted her, then maybe she wouldn’t have ended up like that. He also starts to doubt his decision to kill her: if Dany did what she did because she became mad with grief, then maybe he could have helped her come to her senses. Maybe he didn't have to kill her. Maybe he could have helped her heal. So I headcanon that Jon would be really hard on himself and start to hate himself for killing Dany. (By the way, it's also important to consider Jon's state of mind when he kills Dany. I'm sure seeing thousands of innocents burned by dragonfire must be pretty traumatic, and would push him to decide that killing Dany was necessary).

But not only Jon blames himself, he also starts to blame his family for what they did to Dany. He starts to hate Sansa for conspiring against her (and almost leading to Dany's death, since Sansa telling the truth made Varys try to poison Dany). He blames his family for being so cold to Dany, for using her for her resources and then discarding her, and thinks about how things could have gone differently if they hadn't done these things. And at some point, Jon will remember Bran's cryptic line about him being "exactly where he was supposed to be", and start to get suspicious that Bran knew what Dany would do, and that Bran knew Jon would end up killing her, and did nothing to prevent it. But Jon will brush off these suspicions by thinking that "his family would never do this to him".

Meanwhile, Dany will, obviously, be resurrected. Drogon will take her body to Volantis, but since he is an animal, it's not like he knows what to do with it. So he will rest with her body and mourn her somewhere in Volantis, and some slaves will find him. Said slaves will recognize Dany. They have never seen her, of course, but seeing a silver haired woman and a black dragon, it's not difficult to guess who she is. And they will also mourn her, of course. Dany was a hope to many slaves. These slaves also hoped that Dany would come to save them, so seeing the dragon queen dead is the death of those dreams. They try to get to Drogon, and Drogon, slowly, comes to trust them to get near Dany. They bring a red priestess to where Dany's body is to make the rites usually done for the dead and honor the dragon queen. They don't really tell this to anyone, because they don't want her body to be found and desecrated by slave masters. So the ceremony is done in secret. But something they didn't expect happens: as the priestess gives her the last kiss, Dany is resurrected.

Oh, and as soon as Dany is resurrected, something terrible already happens: she has a miscarriage. Dany had found out she was pregnant very recently, and didn't have time to tell Jon. But since he killed her, the baby died, and didn't come back when she was resurrected. (I don't have the link right now, but I remember reading GRRM say that people who return from the dead are those who feel a strong sense of purpose, and I think a fetus wouldn't have that, so I don't think the baby would be resurrected)

Well, with all of this, Dany is incredibly traumatized. She doesn't know she was being warged by Bran, and she feels guilty for what she thinks she did to King's Landing. She has lost another child, she has lost her hope for the future, the love of her life has killed her. So she falls into depression, and starts to live hidden in Volantis (the red priestess that resurrected her helps her with a spell to prevent Bran from using his powers to see her). She has given up on the idea of helping people. And she doesn’t want to fly on Drogon anymore, because she has horrible flashbacks of what she did to King’s Landing, and because she doesn’t trust herself with a weapon as powerful as Drogon.

But after some time, Dany will start coming back to her former self. She’ll see the suffering of the slaves in Volantis, she will hear the news about Volantis going to war against the cities of Dragon’s Bay in order to re-enslave everyone, and she will hear about how some of the Dothraki have come back to their old ways and are enslaving again, and she’ll decide that she needs to do something about it. This is when she decides to ride Drogon again.

*by the way, here’s a parenthesis about the political situation in Essos*

Volantis has slavery, and is preparing for war against Meereen and Astapor. Meereen and Astapor are still strong and anti-slavery, because Dany left former slaves in the government, and she also left military forces to avoid her new governments being overthrown (like what happened the first time in Astapor, so Dany learned from her mistakes). Daario is still loyal to Dany, because he really loved her (and also because the Meereenese government is paying him to protect the city, so he really has no reason to turn on them). In Yunkai, however, Dany had wanted to do the same thing she did in Astapor (kill all the masters), but Tyrion convinced her not to do it, opting for only cutting the throats of two of the Yunkish leaders. This means that even though Yunkai is being watched by Dany’s army in the region, and they don’t openly sell slaves anymore (lest they provoke a war against Astapor in Meereen, which would be bad now that Yunkai is weakened), the Yunkish leaders are still conspiring to bring back slavery, but this time, instead of funding the Sons of the Harpy (once again, they’re not doing this anymore because Astapor and Meereen are aware that they were the culprits, and the resurgence of the Sons of the Harpy would mean war as well), they are secretly negotiating with Volantis, asking for help (since the end of slavery in Dragon’s Bay meant that the price of slaves went up, and Volantis’ economy was suffering because of this).

Meanwhile, some of the Dothraki returned to Essos. Of the ones that returned, some Dothraki believed in Dany, meaning that they didn’t return to the old ways and some even have hope that she will return, since she’s the Stallion that Mounts the World. While others have made up their own khalasars, and started enslaving and raiding again (even selling slaves to Volantis and other slave cities that remained). These khalasars that returned to the old ways are allied with Volantis.

I don’t  really have a headcanon for cities like Pentos, Myr, Tyrosh, Lys and others. I don’t know if they will still have slavery or not. The show doesn’t really mention it as far as I remember, so it could go either way.

*end of parenthesis about Essos*

So Dany starts by seeking for her khalasar, the ones that are in Essos. Some of the Dothraki (the ones that didn’t go back to their old ways and didn’t go back to being slavers) eagerly accept her back. Together with them, Dany starts again her army, and they end up defeating those other khalasars that started enslaving again. So once again, Dany unites the khalasars in Essos. But there are still some Dothraki left in Westeros, so Dany hasn’t reunited all khalasars yet.

After uniting the khalasars in Essos, stopping them from engaging in slavery, and stopping them from selling slaves to Volantis and other cities, at some point, Dany will reunite with the Unsullied. Together with her new khalasar, the Unsullied, and Drogon, Dany will start a war against the slave cities that remain in Essos. She will liberate Volantis and many other cities. She will go back to Slaver’s Bay and destroy the counter-revolutionary movement in Yunkai. She will reunite with Daario too, and things will happen between them, because I ship Dany and Daario, and also because I think Dany deserves to have some physical and emotional comfort before she reunites with Jon.

So with all that Dany is doing in Essos, news of Dany’s resurrection will reach Westeros, and they will greatly worry Bran, Tyrion and Sansa.

*And here’s another parenthesis, about the political situation in Westeros*

Tyrion is now theoretically Lord of Casterly Rock, but the Lannisters of Lannisport are opposing him (and unfortunately, ableism is a part of it). Tyrion has support from some of them, with whom he had a good relationship in the past, but not from most of them (and that fact the he killed Tywin is obviously another reason why many would oppose him). However, most of the Lannisport Lannisters start to die or disappear mysteriously - through suicide, through murder, or simply disappearing. This isn’t Tyrion’s doing, though. He doesn’t know why this is happening, but in the end, only his allies survived, and Tyrion starts to get a better hold on the Westerlands. (What is actually happening is that Bran has spies/ravens and is ordering the killing of those he views as opposition. He does this because he sees no other choice, because the situation in the Six Kingdoms is very chaotic)

In the Reach, Bronn is now lord, which is pissing off many lords (they think it’s an absurd that a sellsword was given Highgarden when many of the Reach families had better claims to it). He has the support of the Tarlys, because Sam’s family wants to support the new regime. But the region is in a chaos. Many lords are rebelling, the smallfolk are rebelling because Bronn is greedy and exploits them, and doesn’t give them justice (They aren’t necessarily hungry, because it’s the Reach. But Bronn is trying to indulge some lords to gain their alliance and be able to contend against the lords that are against him, so he let’s them do whatever they want with the smallfolk and offers the smallfolk no protection). Outlaw groups start to form to fight against Bronn and his allies, but he answers with brutality to those who oppose him or that try to ask him for anything better for the smallfolk. Bronn keeps his own sellsword army, that he rewards greatly to help him stop the smallfolk from claiming for more rights (and spending so much money on sellswords gains Bronn the enmities of some lords and smallfolk). Some of the Unsullied didn’t go to Naath (only Grey Worm’s closest friends went), and stayed in the Reach, and they help the outlaw groups.

The new prince of Dorne doesn’t have any allegiance to Bran. As soon as things calm down, he declares for Independence, given that King Bran gave independence to his own sister. He stops paying tributes, and Bran sends troops (composed of soldiers from the Crownlands, the Westerlands, Riverlands and the Stormlands) against them. The prince of Dorne answers, ready to fight for his independence. Bran brutally crushes his opposition.

Yara and the Ironborn want independence. Yara also resents the Starks for killing Dany, and also for making her brother die for them. She has taken back the Iron Islands from Euron in season 8, but now, without Dany’s support and the fear of dragons, some of the Ironborn don’t want a woman as their queen, and they want to go back to the old ways as Euron promised (while Yara, still loyal to Dany, has decided to uphold her ideals, decreeing that there should be no more raiding and raping). So the Iron Islands declare independence, but they are divided. Yara still has more support (since many of Euron’s supporters died in Dany’s attack to King’s Landing), but the few that don’t follow her start to raid the Riverlands, Westerlands and the North.

Edmure is a good lord, but the Riverlands have suffered greatly from the wars and the winter. When he tries to ask the Iron Throne for help to feed his people, the Iron Throne doesn’t send much. His niece Sansa is not going to help either (as she has her own concerns with food and can’t share), and Edmure starts go get disillusioned with the new regime and with his own family, who won’t help him, and who will also make his people fight in another war (against Dorne), while his people are being attacked by the Ironborn. And he doesn’t forget how Sansa humiliated him at the Dragonpit.

Gendry is loyal to the Starks, but only because he knew Arya and Jon. With both of them gone, his loyalty to King Bran is weak. He cares more about his own smallfolk. Gendry was a lowborn bastard after all, so he wants to do everything he can for them. But with time, he sees that the new regime is not interested in helping the smallfolk, just like they weren’t interested in listening to Sam’s idea of democracy. His loyalty also starts to waver. He also has problems with some lords from the Stormlands that don’t like that some bastard is now in charge, but it’s less than Bronn, since Gendry is indeed trying to be a good lord, and he is indeed Robert Baratheon’s son (he was recognized as such by Stannis Baratheon, and later by Daenerys Targaryen, so now it’s common knowledge).

The North also suffered with the War for the Dawn and the winter. Sansa is regarded as a competent lady by the Northern lords, but she has no love in the North. The Northern Lords kinda just got stuck with her. Sansa had stored grain in Winterfell to feed the castle and her armies, but that only means that the smallfolk in other parts of the North had to give up part of their harvest to send to Winterfell, and now, with the Winter, they are starving. To quell discontentment, Sansa tries bringing food from White Harbour, and Bran also sends her food. The fact that Bran is sending food to his sister for lower prices than usually done when trading with other foreign lands makes the lords of the Six Kingdoms angry. Bran stops sending so much food, so Sansa starts demanding more tributes from White Harbour. This angers Lord Manderly more and more, and Lord Manderly decides to demand for independence. Sansa had publicly complained many times about Dany being a tyrant for not giving her independence, so he uses the same argument Sansa used in the Dragonpit: White Harbour had suffered too much: they had sent their troops to fight the Night King alongside the Starks, but not only that, they had been the ones that most contributed to feeding the North. Because of this, he thinks he deserves independence, just like Sansa argued that she deserved independence from the Seven Kingdoms. He argues that what Sansa did created a precedent for independence, and that it would be tyranny if she refused to give it to him. Sansa is outraged, and sends her troops to make Lord Manderly bend the knee and force him to send food again.

The Vale will stay loyal to the Starks to the end, since they have mostly been left alone, and are not having as much problems with food (they weren’t very affected by wars, and their land is fertile). Nepotism also helps, because Bran won’t demand too much from his family. Edmure, also Bran’s family, was asking for help, but Tyrion advised that Lord Royce, the regent of the Vale and Sweetrobin’s advisor, was a proud man and their most loyal ally, and that angering him and making him send food to the Riverlands would be bad for them (Tyrion was wrong, as always).

By the way, winter isn’t over. Book speculation often said that the Others were the cause of the long winter, but in the show, we saw that there was snow in King’s Landing even after the White Walkers were defeated. So here, we’ll accept the fact that the seasons being long is just a normal thing for their world. After they kill Dany, Westeros goes through a few months of “false spring”, but winter returns stronger than ever after that. Crops die, hunger spreads through the land.

So basically, everything is chaos.

*end of the parenthesis about Westeros*

So with the chaos that is happening in Westeros, and the news of Dany’s return, Bran, Tyrion and Sansa start to get nervous. They pardon Jon, and Sansa sends men after Jon to bring him back from beyond the Wall, because she believes having Jon in Winterfell could serve as a shield in case Dany attacks (she thinks Dany might still love him, or that Jon might be able to negotiate with her. In a last case scenario, she could deliver Jon to Dany to make Dany leave her alone), and also, because she feels lonely, since her entire family left her.

Jon comes back to Winterfell. At some point, he overhears a conversation between Sansa and Maester Wolkan. Maester Wolkan was in the room when Sansa asked Bran to warg into Dany, and he knows the truth. Sansa sworn him to secrecy, but now, he comes to her with news of Dany’s resurrection, and asks Sansa if Dany would want revenge for Bran having warged into her. Sansa answers that she is not sure that Daenerys has memories or if she is aware that she was being warged, and if Daenerys doesn’t remember, she might not seek revenge.

So when Jon overhears this conversation, he learns that Daenerys was innocent, and that she is alive. He is horrified by what his family did, and also feels guilty for not believing in Daenerys, for having trusted his family and dismissed Dany’s fears, and so on. There’s a lot of angst. Jon then pretends he didn’t hear Sansa’s conversation, and pretends that everything is ok. He runs away from Winterfell in the middle of the night, without warning, with the intention of going to Dany.

From this moment on, I’m not really sure of what happens. I like the idea of Jon spending some time in the South, helping outlaw groups in the Reach, and learning about his brother’s tyranny. On the other hand, I don’t know how Jon could escape being seen by Bran’s ravens. So maybe Jon simply takes a ship and goes to Essos. But before he manages to take his ship, I still like to think that he talks with the smallfolk and hears what has been happening in Westeros (since he didn’t hear anything about it when he was exiled beyond the Wall).

Jon and Dany eventually reunite. Jon is brought to her in her war camp (because Dany is still at war with the slavers in Essos). While on the one hand Dany feels angry at Jon for killing her, for not supporting her and for giving up on her, on the other hand, she feels ashamed of what she did in King’s Landing and thinks she deserved to die (after all, Dany herself would have killed a person that burned innocents for no reason). So she accepts to meet Jon, but only with her guards around her, because while she still loves Jon, she is also afraid of him. Dany doesn’t have any intention of getting revenge against Jon, since she feels guilty about what she did. She is curious about what could possibly be the reason for Jon to look for her again, and thinks that he wants to kill her in the name of his family.

Jon is still very confused and tormented, and while a part of him believes that Dany is innocent, another part of him doesn’t want to believe that his siblings would have been capable of doing such an atrocity. So when he and Dany talk, he starts by asking her why she did what she did to King’s Landing. Dany answers that she doesn’t really know. That before she realized, she was doing it, like she couldn’t control herself. She tells Jon that her memories of King’s Landing almost don’t feel real, and that she is ashamed of what she did. This convinces Jon that Dany is indeed innocent, and he tells her the truth.

And this causes a lot of angst, of course. Initially, it makes Dany angry that he didn’t believe in her innocence and that he gave up on her so easily. She accuses him of having betrayed her, of having abandoned her. She also tells Jon that she was pregnant, and that because he killed her, he also killed their child (and this of course, makes Jon feel even more guilty). But with time, the anger passes, and she starts to see Jon as another victim of his family’s machinations (unlike Jon, who was hesitant in believing the worst of his siblings, Dany has a very low opinion of the Starks).

So Dany forgives Jon. They don’t return to their romantic relationship, but consider each other friends. And Jon starts to help her in her fight against slavery in Essos. This makes them content, since neither of them wants to ever return to Westeros. But unfortunately for them, news of Dany’s resurrection have started to reach more people, and lords from Westeros come to her to ask for her help in deposing Bran and the lords loyal to him. Listening to all the things that are happening in Westeros and how much the people are suffering only angers Dany. And it angers Jon as well. So they make plans to return to Westeros. Dany leaves a big part of her army of Unsullied and Dothraki in Essos, so that they could keep on with their fight against the masters. She returns to Westeros mostly with the army of their Westerosi allies (and her dragon, of course).

Dany has in mind a new political system, with a council of noblemen and a council of the smallfolk, so she negotiates with her allies with this in mind, making it clear that if they want to support her claim, they also have to support her reforms She has decided that she won’t hesitate to use force against the lords who don’t accept her reforms.

*another parenthesis*

Since I said I didn’t really have everything figured out, here are some alternatives to the things that I just described:

Maybe the reason Jon went back to Winterfell wasn’t because Sansa called him, but because when Jon was beyond the Wall, he saw that the White Walkers weren’t entirely gone. So maybe, what makes Dany return to Westeros isn’t that she wants revenge or because the lords are asking her to return, but because of the White Walkers. This would leave her conflicted, because the last time she tried to help those people she was betrayed and killed.

Or maybe Dany’s motivation to return to Westeros are just that she wants revenge. In this case, maybe she won’t even accept the alliance with the Lords, because she wants to change things for the common people. Or maybe she makes alliances with lesser lords promising them more political influence and that lesser lords would have as much sway as high lords in her new system (as well as smallfolk would also have more power).

*end of parenthesis*

Whatever Dany’s motivations for returning to Westeros are, she returns to Westeros, takes back the throne, and takes revenge. Dany is no longer the trusting soft person she was when she first went to Westeros. She comes with fire and blood, uses force when she needs to. Bran dies, because he is way too powerful for Dany to keep alive and trust that he won’t warg or spy on anyone again. As for Sansa and Tyrion, I could see different endgames: they could be exiled, imprisoned and kept as hostages, or Dany could kill them both for treason: Sansa because she revealed Jon’s parentage against Jon and Dany’s wishes, and also because of her part in the plan to make Bran warg into Dany; and Tyrion for telling what Sansa told him to Varys without Dany’s permission, which led Varys to try to poison Dany, and Dany could have died due to Tyrion’s actions; though I could see Dany being more lenient towards Tyrion than Sansa, since Sansa’s crimes are more grave. But I don’t see Dany ever accepting him as an advisor again.

Jonerys will reconcile and rule. There might be some conflict with Jon because he doesn’t want to see his family die (which is why there could be the possibility of keeping Sansa alive but as a prisoner), but in the end they get back together, marry and have children. Dany creates a new government in which both smallfolk and lords can have representatives and create laws, and she creates laws that limit the powers of the lords and stops them from abusing the smallfolk. She could also give some autonomy to each of the kingdoms: she doesn’t fully give them independence, but this greater autonomy helps quell the growing wishes for independence from each of the kingdoms.

So that’s my post season 8 headcanon. Dany was entirely innocent, the Starks were the villains, and Bran warged into Dany. Btw, if anyone wants to use this headcanon to actually write a fic, feel free to do so. Just please tell me because I’d love to read it.

[janiedean]

I really, really love your metas! In "Why a Jaime/Brienne Endgame in the Books Makes More Sense Than One Might Think, Based on Previous Works of GRRM's" you wrote, that you have endless reasons to assume that both, J and B, will survive the whole series - can you please name some? Aside from this mentioned meta I've only read an explantion of the weirwood dream, which can be interpreted in both ways. Or can you link a good meta that explains other reasons? Thank you very much!

hey!

first of all thank you so much, glad that you appreciate my rants. ;) that said, sure I can go in-depth. in order (btw @ginmo has written also some excellent meta about this, just check on her blog), and also counting the weirwood dream which I’ve ranted on at length in that specific meta:

now, the first thing is how grrm strategically placed these two in the narrative, in the sense that:

brienne has spent her life being passed for a joke and she desperately wants for someone to see her worth as a person and she’d about kill herself for the people who manage to get as far as to gain her trust/love, jaime has spent his life loving people without getting much in return and with that trust being used/abused/thrown away and everyone taking it for granted... and we’re assuming they’re not set up to be together when as stated grrm has written them as romantic from the first moment?

(also, jaime’s entire first chapter in asos is basically ‘I find brienne attractive but since I never considered that I could be attracted to anyone but cersei I can’t understand I’m attracted to her so I’ll stare at her and think she’s ugly all along even if I really am attracted to her. brienne’s issues are also rooted in the fact that no one sees her as attractive. jaime does. hmmm?)

both of them start from a miserable situation from which they’re finding their own way up, not down - jaime is more obvious but brienne is too because she starts at the point where she’s so starved for recognition she would die for someone who just was nice to her but didn’t really gaf about her and now she’s... well, becoming a knight because sure af that is happening, I’m sticking with the theory that the knighting is book canon too -, and if they both end up miserable or one of them does it doesn’t work;

both of their chapters have heavy foreshadowing concerning possible marriage/having children/finding love - jaime wants to father his kids and at some point resents that other men are husbands and fathers but not him because he was always the warrior and he doesn’t say it happily, brienne is half-glad her first betrothed died because she thinks she’s not suited to typical feminine things/to fit into a woman’s role in society but she’s also sad at thinking she will never have children, these two are going to get together very soon, and I’m supposed to think they’re set up for failure? k but I can respectfully disagree;

also, this goes back to that meta I wrote in which I said that grrm does not do grim for grim’s sake and he’s actually way less cruel than it seems, likes a good love story and has more than once finished his other books with satisfying resolutions to that kind of storyline, but adding to that: in comparison to whatever calvinist crap message hbo wanted to send, I have to inform y’all that grrm is a currently agnostic lapsed catholic and it’s exceedingly clear in the way he explores/deals with redemptive themes.

now, let me break the jb narrative for a moment to inform you of a few things that as an atheist born and raised in a 99% catholic country whose literature’s funding works are heavily based on catholic themes/on stories rooted in catholicism:

the ‘you need to die to be redeemed’ narrative is 100% bullshit according to catholic morals and on top of that it’s opened to anyone at any time;

like, the basic distinction between catholic and calvinist approaches to the topic (and I can’t believe I’m defending catholicism but nvm that) is that calvinism preys on a narrative where your negative qualities define you and you cannot escape them (which is because calvinism accepts predestination ie the idea that seeing your lot in life you can deduce if you’ll go to heaven or hell, so if you’re poor/unsuccessful/you committed mistakes/a crime and so on you’re not redeemable and it’s proof you’re damned) and that meant that in societies with calvinist background the death = redemption narrative is extremely popular because it’s seen as ‘hey this person is wretched and they suck so they couldn’t have lived anyway and they did something good with it for once and it’s the best they could hope for’. catholicism, at the contrary, works on the basis that as we all have free will we can change for the better and if you repent for your sins/past wrongdoings/mistakes then that’s enough to be redeemed and if you do it on your deathbed.... you can still go to heaven, you’ll just have to atone for your wrongdoings (that’s the entire point of purgatory’s existence ie making people who repented near death or too late to gain heaven atone for their sins before they can enter heaven). and the moment you repent then you’re free to start your new life and do better and gain your place in heaven, which you’ll obtain in virtue of having turned a new leaf;

(again: not to be that person, but in luke’s gospel one of the two thieves crucified with him is like ‘can you save us since you’re the son of god’, the other thief is like ‘please he has done nothing and we have sinned we don’t deserve to be saved just please remember us when you go back to your father’ and jesus tells the second thief I won’t need to remember you because you’ll sit at my right. also, in dante’s divine comedy there’s a guy who had been excommunicated in the middle ages waiting to get into purgatory for having repented on his deathbed and in manzoni’s the betrothed ie italy’s funding novel the character who’s objectively better written is a dude so heinous for his crimes that he’s called THE UNNAMED and the moment this guy gets doubts and wonders if there’s any hope for him left the local arcibishop leaves everything saying that the moment someone like that is in need then they’re more important than his own parish, goes to receive unnamed guy, tells him that just wanting to be better is enough as far as god is concerned and he’s saved as far as he cares. like, as much as catholicism sucks for the entire rest of it and for how much the catholic church is the worst ideologically the fact that everyone can be redeemed is the basic staple of the entire thing.)

now, given the ^^^, this is where I tell you that most lapsed catholics/people who left catholicism for whichever reasons usually grew up catholic and if you grow up catholic you spend your first twelve years in church at least and if your parents/people around you are also catholic you will absorb it, good and bad, so if grrm grew up catholic, he grew up with that background. (I could again rant for hours about how atheist writers who grew up catholic differ from atheist writers who grew up protestant/calvinist because if you compare grrm and idk kurt vonnegut it’s glaring but this isn’t the place for it so nvm let’s go on)

now that I’ve told you this, I’ll get back to jaime and brienne’s canon survival chances. I needed to tell you that because...

all of the stories with redemptive themes in asoiaf (jaime, theon, sandor, whoever) are not by nature calvinist. whatever d&d think or hbo thought, none of them are written in a way where death is their best option/their only way to achieve redemption/to finish their story with dignity. theon has gone through hell and back and left and regained his sense of identity, he’s not built to die now, sandor has freaking gone to rehab and I’m 100% sure he survives the series and gets closure, while jaime is exactly a poster child for the above stuff I described. like, jaime is someone who’s fundamentally good who had the misfortune to spend his entire life jumping in different kinds of abusive situation one to the other (tywin’s parentage in general, his relationship with cersei throughout at least from the moment they were *experimenting* and like hell I’m going back on that sorry not sorry, guarding aerys, being with cersei at *her* terms and being forced to relieve his trauma all over and not having his needs met etc., tywin potentially ruining his only healthy relationship [with tyrion] and so on) who in turn has done exceedingly bad things/taken bad decision/committed heinous deeds that he regrets having done out of his bad reaction to all of that, not treating his ptsd and basically deciding to stop giving a fuck and embrace being the horrid person everyone thinks he is... until he meets brienne, remembers who he wanted to be because she’s posing an example of it and decides on his own to try and be better, which is... exactly... the entire fucking point. the moment he decides to try and be better and reclaims his dreams/the person he wanted to be/tries to do good he has automatically achieved a narrative status where he chose to be better and therefore the narrative is giving him a chance to be that, and usually those stories are meant to.... have the message that you can be better than the bad things you did and you can turn back the page at any point. like. jaime is written to show you that it’s not too late to get your shit together and not letting others/your surroundings define who you are;

on the other side, brienne is presented as extremely sympathetic from the beginning. also, grrm is very good at describing how shitty is your life if you grow up a woman who is not standard attractive, that everyone laughs at and who has endless insecurities for it.... and she’s the paragon of knighthood/everything good about chivalry in the goddamned series. brienne is legit one of the best people in these books and it’s not because I stan her - she’s kind, she’s just, she’s brave she’s everything a knight should be, she’s willing to change her mind when she misjudged people, she’s forgiving and life threw her crap all along and she’s still persevering from it. brienne is written in a frankly painfully objective way to eventually succeed at what she wants. if in affc she’s crying because she feels like she’s too much of a freak to be her father’s heir and she’s not woman or man enough for anything, the entire narrative point is that she has to succeed at both being a knight and a lady otherwise grrm can’t plant hints and believe me he can;

this means that jaime is headed on a redemptive path which in that kind of story when written by catholics or former catholics never ends up badly (also, aside: redemption is good for everyone and it can’t be just ONE character having it, you don’t buy it at the supermarket, so saying that if jaime has it then tyrion or theon or sandor or whoever can’t have it is just poor reading, people change all the time irl and in narrative you aren’t obligated to redeem one and kill everyone else) or in death, brienne has been written to succeed in her endeavors after she suffers a shitton and I think stoneheart has to be the worst and the end of it (in the sense that after that situation is resolved the way for her is down, not up). which if I do the math and we have stated they’re headed for romance, means the both of them should have a chance at a future together;

also, I can go and tell you that their asos road trip ending with harrenhal is bursting with symbolism that includes death and rebirth - not going into the weirwood dream and sticking to the basics... guys, jaime starts as a prisoner, then ends up losing a part of herself he thinks define him but in truth only defines what he thinks he is (and he’s not ie cersei’s double, the kingslayer, the person who has to drive himself crazy to protect everyone else), then ends up almost dying and sitting in the middle of his own filth for the entirety of the trip (and even then he does good things ie saving brienne from being raped *cough*) and then ends up in a scalding hot bath where he confesses his most well-kept secret and source of 50% of his trauma to someone he trusts regardless of how much he likes it or not, faints and then wakes up again when everyone thinks he might be dead. symbolically, I think it speaks for itself. thing is, during the entire thing *brienne* is there alongside him and while she’s also getting her own share of trauma/ptsd (I mean brienne has totally bloody mummers related ptsd and I’ll die on that hill) she physically is the reason he survives it - she cleans him up, she gives him enough pep talks to convince him to live, she hears his confession, she changes her mind about him for it (but imvho she had after he saved her from being raped because that’s where she calls him ser for the first time) and she catches him in the bath when he faints which is.... fairly symbolic in itself, and she is the one who puts him back on his feet after. like, while jaime’s choices after are all his own, his symbolic journey through his own physical/mental filth he has to go through during asos succeeds because she helped him even if she didn’t know she was doing it, and like... guys, there’s a reason why in the weirwood dream the brienne in jaime’s head which he has conjured and who is basically what jaime sees brienne as in that moment, not necessarily the real one..... keeps on telling him all the time she’ll keep him safe/protect him and she basically tells that to anyone he feels threatened by (or his subconscious feels threatened by), and as stated before, jaime lannister has never, until that point, assumed that *he* would be in the position where someone else gives a shit about him to the point where they will defend him rather than in the position where *he* is the person that has to protect everyone else regardless of how much appreciation he gets in return. like, excuse me but if I was writing my own book I wouldn’t put this much work and care and this symbolism in these two’s history if I meant to kill one of them off or to not have them be happy in the end.

like, the point is: grrm is an extremely meticulous writer with an astonishing attention to detail and who put in book two shit that made extra sense when reading book FIVE, see theon saying he wouldn’t go to his death wearing dirty clothing in acok which makes you go like ‘....... why’ the moment you read his adwd chapters. no one, unless they have a penchant for sadism, would put that much work with those themes in that specific kind of story if then it doesn’t deliver. or, in different words, using a character I love as well so no one can accuse me of being impartial: when grrm put the same kind of work in catelyn’s chapters from got to asos and then you read them knowing about lady stoneheart and the red wedding, it’s obvious that he built her up for being an extremely tragic character and that she was destined to die regardless of all her efforts to save her family (same for robb but we’re talking pov characters). but catelyn’s storyline doesn’t have redemptive themes. it’s about regret, loss, loving your children but being imperfect/not being able to be there for them, and so on. catelyn’s storyline never promises you a happy ending from the moment ned dies and probably even before then. catelyn’s storyline promises you endless suffering and that’s fine because that’s her point in the narrative.

on the contrary, brienne’s tells you ‘hey there’s this girl who has had it like shit all her life without deserving it and whose worth no one sees because she’s ugly and who at the same time is actually a genuinely good person who’s trying her best and okay, she’s gonna suffer but she’ll come out on top while getting what she wants which is recognition as both a lady and a knight’ and given that brienne is also an extremely rare rep (say what you want, cishet unattractive women with her issues and her backstory are basically only less rare than unicorns in media) that I’m 100% sure grrm knows speaks to a lot of people (because he writes her too well to not know), if brienne doesn’t get that after all that shit, the narrative would not deliver on a fairly huge promise.

even worse, jaime’s tells you ‘hey there’s this guy who has been an abuse victim to at least three different people who doesn’t even realize it and whose life is so fucked up you’d need fifteen psychology textbooks to even start grasping it and that everyone sees as the worst person ever and who has ended up believing he is out of not managing his trauma well and hey look at him going through an insane amount of extra suffering but coming out of it wanting to be better and sort of succeeding and hey he has setbacks but he’s starting to see himself as his own person and he’s out of his #1 worst abusive relationship and he can decide what to do with his life now and you should root for him’, which means that if he dies or worst of all dies like in the show (but that’s not happening) the narrative doesn’t deliver on a huge promise and gives you the message that you can’t escape your mistakes and the abuse you received...... which is not the message grrm likes/wants to pass. like, I’ll die on that damned hill.

and to finish it, that was for them as single characters, but going back to the beginning: love is a fundamental part of both their storylines. as I said in the beginning, brienne suffered because she wasn’t loved enough and would die for anyone she loves herself without even expecting anything in return because she thinks no one will love her like that, jaime suffered because he loved too much without getting anything in return (or better, getting cersei’s abusive crap for his entire life) and he turned it into something toxic that’s not what he thinks it should be (he sees his and c’s relationship as the best thing ever where they’re soulmates because she sold him that narrative, but that’s not the kind of rship where you *turn your partner’s blows into kisses* which is actual text). at this point, the narrative is telling you ‘oh hey here’s two damaged people who actually would be very good together because their personalities match in that sense [as in, brienne would thrive with someone who loves her that much openly and finds her attractive and respects her for all that she is and jaime would thrive with someone who would appreciate that tenfold and who’d love him back just as much and who’d die for him - canon! -, and it wouldn’t be the kind of rship where anyone’s blows turn into kisses unless they were friendly sparring before] and oh hey look at that they’re in a storyline where they both influence each other greatly and oh wait he’s attracted to her and she thinks he looks like half a god and she’d die for him and he was willing to get mauled by a bear for her and they’re obviously meant to hook up’, which automatically promises a resolution where they both get what they want or you basically spent all your time rooting for it.... for nothing. which would not give anyone reading it satisfaction unless you hate jb that much, but I’m 100% sure that most people reading asoiaf casually would not hate it that much and grrm likes that trope that much to not deliver on it.

so, tldr: if one of them dies or if they aren’t endgame with a reasonable happy-ish ending for the both of them, the entire narrative fails to deliver on the promises of their individual storylines and their shared one, and there’s nothing in grrm’s writing that suggests that he would not deliver on it. I mean, if it was stephen king I’d hold my breath because I love steve but imvho his endings suck 85% of the time and he manages to do 180° turnarounds that have no sense whatsoever, but it’s grrm, not stephen king, and everything of his I’ve read that actually had an ending ended in a way that was coherent with the overall storyline and maintained its promises, so here, the above is pretty much the summary. hopefully I haven’t exhausted you. ;)

[vivilove-jonsa]

hi, i hope you don’t mind but i have a question for you. i was curious as to what your ideal ending for GOT would’ve been? I was just thinking about my baby Arya and Jon and how they were screwed over in the WORST WAY and how their endings made no sense whatsoever, and wanted to know- If you could chose an ending for each of these characters what would it be?Individually or even who they end up with. I wanted gendrya/jonsa but kinda accepted it wouldn’t happen but their individual endings.. sigh

Hey Anon!

No, I don’t mind the question at all although I’ll admit I’ve studiously avoided thinking too much about the final season and all the ways it felt like such a tedious grind to the long-expected ending for one character at the expense of most everything else *sighs*  

I’ve not attempted a ‘fix-it’ fic (or read any) because I have zero desire to dwell too much on all that wasted potential so it’s AU or major canon divergence all the way, baby!  It’s all about individual coping mechanisms, right?

Have I written happy fluff in the past of Jon and Sansa ruling the North or the Seven Kingdoms with their five kids and Direwolves and ridiculously happy while Lord and Lady Baratheon come for visits on occasion and Bran is counseling his family with maybe Meera at his side?  Yeah, but I also know that is not the kind of thing Martin writes.  

That said, what would my ideal ending have been?  

Well, Political Jon would’ve been made crystal clear instead of all that vague inconsistent crap we got.  I can never see Book Jon falling for someone like D.  Sorry, I just can’t buy it.  Ideally, I wanted him to be king with Sansa as his queen/co-ruler and eventually his wife whether that was in just the North or some sort of newly defined Seven Kingdoms.  

I desperately want Sansa’s words ‘no one will ever marry me for love’ to be proven wrong in addition to her being an awesome queen.

I’m fine with Bran being king.  This blog stans House Stark all the way and I love Bran.  It would be amazing for the boy who feared being forever labeled as ‘broken’ to wind up on top but I want it to make sense, too.  

With Arya, I want my girl to choose peace in the end and reject the path of revenge and then just be happy with whoever makes her happiest.  

I think an important thing to remember is that while the endings may be what GRRM intends for our Starks and Jon, I also believe the journey there will be significantly different in the books.  

For instance, I believe Arya’s ending might make more sense in the books.  Her choosing to sail off and go on adventures could be very satisfying if we saw why that was important to her.  (BTW-I have nothing against Gendrya as a ship in show verse but since she’s 11 at the end of Dance, I have a feeling the relationship between her and the hunky blacksmith will be different.)  

Sansa becoming queen is something I’ve long hoped for and the show actually did a decent job in S7 and 8 showing us her caring for her people and preparing for the big fight as well as fighting for the North’s independence.  I’d still love to see what GRRM does with her in the Vale, etc.  

And I would hope that Bran becomes king for reasons other than Tyrion’s monologuing while supposedly on trial for his life...good God, I’m getting twitching remembering this nonsense again, Anon.  

And while I could certainly see Jon choosing a form of self-imposed exile after everything he endures and feels culpable for, I’d like to hope there’s some glimmer that he might return to Winterfell (and Sansa) someday but I don’t know with GRRM aka Evil Santa.  Sansa may forever be the woman he thought he couldn’t have and loses his chance with in spite of learning the truth of his parentage (which btw should fucking mean something in the books besides adding to D’s paranoia, you know?)

Regardless, you can believe that in the books (just like the show) as long as Jon and Sansa are both alive (which we know they will be now) I’m going to head canon they’ll find their way back to each other eventually :)

Thanks for the ask!

[toaquiprashippar]

My Rewatch Notes :)

Hiiiiii guys!

I know everyone’s been doing their own rewatch and I’m sure none of the things I’ll write here will be news but I just thought I would share a few things I noticed as I watched everything. I think It’s actually my first COMPLETE rewatch, I freaking loved it. I just finished it and I’m in tears. BUT I did take some notes and commented on them here, so here goes nothing. LOL

SEASON 1

I love how when Jon claims he’s not a Stark, he finds his direwolf which is the ultimate proof yuup he is one.

The fact that Robert threatens Ned with the very things Joffrey does after? Damn, this show is cruel.

Maester Aemon’s words tends to stay with Jon and I bet your ass he will think back to Maester Aemon’s words on how honor is nothing compared to the love of a family. He thought Ned would always choose honor because he always did the right thing, yet he compromised his honor for Jon, which Jon thought he would neeeever…I know he’ll be upset at first but have you ever considered how deeply this will strike him? How he will realize he’s been deeply loved this entire time?

SEASON 2

Was not a bad season, actually it was a very good one but I didn’t take many notes here, sorry. 

But we cannot avoid mentioning the House of the Undying, Dany does not touch the throne and goes to what it looks like the Wall. Do notice that when she’s in the throne room, The Red Keep seems to be destroyed. Not like it was in s7, but maybe how it will be in s8? But she does change her course to go to what her heart’s desire, love, family. She is so happy to see her former husband and her baby, but she leaves them because she knows they’re not real. The dragons call her and she returns to them, it doesn’t mean she’ll never get to the throne room again or that she will never rule, it means that had other priorities at some point, but her children reminded her of reality and she went back for them.  I’m saying this because people love to use this as a foreshadowing for her not becoming a Queen. So if you’re going there, I am as well. 

SEASON 3

Arya telling Gendry he can be her family is a total foreshadowing to me and no one will ever change my mind but you are allowed to rub it in my face if s8 ends and they’re not together, although you’ll be making fun of a sad shipper.

Littlefinger actually describes many of the upcoming deaths as he speaks to Sweetrobin, I nearly fell off my chair the moment I realized that one LOL SO FREAKING CLEVER, It’s one of the reasons why I love this show.

SEASON 4

Tyrion’s speech at his trial is one of the best scenes of the entire show. Of any character! That’s it, thanks for coming to season 4 and my ted talk. 

SEASON 5

Tyrion asks Ser Jorah when will they go back to build cities like Valyria, I thought: “Hmmmmmm, maybe a hope for the future? Nothing is said without a reason at this amazing show.”

I really hope Jaime saying he wants to die in the arms of the woman he loves does not mean that I get to see Jaime dying in Brienne’s arms. Or else there’ll be tears. LOADS. Like hours of it. 

This one is nothing new, I just wanted to point out that Jon refused a beautiful woman like Melisandre because he was still in love with Ygritte, yet…he slept with Daenerys. Y’all know where I’m going with this but I just would not miss the opportunity to point it out! :D

It’s pretty obvious by now, but I loved how Sam assured Olly that Jon always comes back, maybe this was a foreshadowing for only S6E2, but who knows, for s8? A fangirl can dream.

SEASON 6

Theon says he will never be able to make amends for the things that he’s done for the Starks, maybe he will…in s8? I know he’s saved Sansa and that’s a good way to redeem yourself, but he was partially to blame for Robb and Catelyn’s deaths (he betrayed and weakened Robb’s campaign), Rickon’s as well since he only ends up where he did because he escaped Theon in the first place. Maybe this is how he goes? If he does at all, I mean. Maybe he either saves Bran or Sansa? Just thought it was worth mentioning.

Tommen tells Cersei all the things he should have done to the High Sparrow, and some of those stuff like killing the man and destroying the Sept, our Mad Queen actually does, so I thought that was actually a clever and discreet one.

Olenna tells Cersei she’s alone, surrounded by thousands of enemies, left by her brother and all the family she had. She asks Cersei what would she do, kill everyone? Well, I bet she’ll try at some point in s8, and I though this sounded like a proper foreshadowing. I’ll let you guys decide for yourselves.

Is it just me or we get to the see the face the Waif wears as she attack Arya on the bridge when she first meets the Hall of Faces?

Arya deciding who she is, yup, I cried AGAIN. 

One of my biggest problems with Sansa was her behavior towards the Battle of the Bastards, she could have saved maaaaany lives just by saying a few words. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and mine of her changed after 6.09, not gonna lie. 

Sansa murdering Ramsay was probably one of my favoirte Sansa moments of all show. 

SEASON 7

Arya amazingly starts the season with the beeeeautiful words: “leave one wolf alive and the sheep are never safe.”, right? Well, next episode Olenna clears things up telling Danny is no sheep, she’s a dragon, therefore to be a dragon. If Dany is no sheep, then a diehard fan can assume she’s safe? Or not and just ignore me LOL

Jaime being told Cersei will be the death of him by Olenna kind of breaks my heart because fuck she will :( That’s a sad but accurate foreshadowing to me, honestly. PLUS: ‘TELL CERSEI, I WANT HER TO KNOW IT WAS ME’ will always be one of the best quotes in Game of Thrones!

Jon punching Littlefinger has nothing to do with him being in love with Sansa, he’s protecting the sister he knows been through enough shit, especially when it comes to men. Sorry to burst some shippers bubble. 

Melisandre letting us know Varys and her will be killed this season, WAY TO SPOILER THE SHOW, bitch. LOL

WHY THE FUCK WOULD THE HOUND THROW STONES AT THESE BITCHES? Sandor, bitch, I expected more from you.

Drogon is so close to the NK, and Rhaegal is not far behind, why would he attack Viserion? Maybe because he knows something we don’t and I’m eager to learn. It’s not a foreshadowing, just a questioning.

The way Rhaegal cries in the back as Jon gets pissed and attacks it’s almost as if we’re seeing the physical manifestation of his pain, it’s his pure connection to his Targaryen blood. That scene is amazing and I don’t have words to say how this “little” thing affected me.

The way everyone is shocked beyond words when Viserion dies is amazing, nothing is deadlier than dragons in the world of Ice and Fire, and for them to see a mighty creature as a dragon to be murder by this villain, shows them how helpless they are and how serious the threat is, if a dragon is not invincible, what does that make them? If a dragon can be killed, anyone else can as well. It’s a short moment but one that says a lot to me. Powerful af.

ONE WORD: CLEGANEBOWL.

“Jon is young and unmarried. Daenerys is young and unmarried…together they would be difficult to defeat.” I would love to take that as a foreshadowing, so keep it mind, Cersei and everyone else out for my babes.

BTW, can we talk about Ser Jorah’s ‘fuck me’ face when Dany tells that she and Jon will sail together, AND YOU CAN SEE THE HIDDEN MISCHIEF IN JON’S EYES! LOL I live for that.

Jon telling Theon how he does not have to choose, that he’s both a Greyjoy and a Stark is a delicious foreshadowing to me on how he’ll come in terms with his own parentage reveal in time, he’ll see that he is not only a Stark and a Targaryen but also a Snow, and for him to somehow be in peace with it. I can’t wait, honestly.

I think it makes sense that Arya and Sansa won’t like Dany at first, Daenerys is beautiful and charming, they will think Jon is in love or smt, I mean…can you blame them for being wary of anyone outside their family? But I bet all of your asses that in time, they’ll see Dany for what she truly is, not just worthy, but family as well. That line at the end of 7.06 between Dany and Jon could very well mean this! :)

So, just to point out a thought: Jaime and Cersei’s child will not be born and the dead will probably come South. UGH, season 8 cannot come soon enough!

“He loved her...and she loved him.” But sure, political!j0n 

In a season that defines identities, such as Arya with her ‘Home’ theme, Bran claiming to be the Three Eyed Raven and not Bran anymore, Sansa to be totally comfortable with her place as Lady of Winterfell… Jon leaves Winterfell and goes to Dragonstone (to seek dragonglass but we know what he finds…love, and we find his identity). Not to mention he finishes the season going back to Winterfell, but also with the promise of going back South again to fight for Dany. If that’s not a claim on his identity, IDK WHAT IS.

It's hardly a final project for a degree or masters but I thought it was worth writing down a few things that caught my attention. Whatever I did not write, I was probably either too lazy or too comfortable lying down to take notes.

Anyway, what do you guys think?

[rissa-rey]

Edited: I’ve added a keep reading because I’m tired of y’all messaging me.  Blacklist your tags, friends, cause I’m not dragging my laptop out just to add a cut for you assholes again.  Since this dropped early, you get one freebie.  One.  I tagged properly the first time.  Don’t @ me. 

Spoilers for 8x02...

SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!

I can’t believe NO ONE rightly pointed out to Daenerys that she was spouting that nonsense bullshit about her trash father in the hall of the man said piece of garbage father murdered. Like bitch you’re really going to run your mouth about the greatest deed of Jaime’s life while sitting in Rickard Stark’s hall? STFU. Book Daenerys is legitimately one of my favorite characters but the D&D version...I just want someone to punch her in the face everytime she unhinges her jaw to spew more asinine horseshit.

I loved Brienne speaking up for Jaime. And Sansa’s reaction—I want more Sansa and Brienne.

Is there trouble in ✨paradise✨? Looks like there is...where are you running off to, Jonathan Snowflake?

Why is she attacking Tyrion? God why is she so fucking stupid. I lose IQ points everytime she opens her damn mouth.

I feel like they’re setting us up for disillusioned Jorah...

I’ve never been a proponent of political!Jon but uh...

Sansa has not come to play with these hoes. What about the North, Daenerys? What you think because you “bonded” over the fact that you both have a vajayjay, and men think that makes you dumb, that means that Sansa is suddenly going to forget all about her own house and family and people for the sake of your dumbass crown?

Give ST all the Emmys already for that scene though...you can see the moment she goes from “I’m going to cut a bitch” to “Joffrey is my one true love...” Her face is so expressive, I can’t deal with it.

Theon!!!! I know everyone keeps talking about Dany’s face when Theon pledges to fight for the Starks but who the fuck cares about the Empress of Entitlement when Theon and Sansa are looking at each other like THAT?!

Pretty sure that little girl in the yard with Davos was supposed to ~trigger~ thoughts of Shireen. Down to the scars on the side of her face and everything. Also, could we give Gilly more than three lines please? Thanks.

TORMUND AND FRIENDS HAVE ARRIVED!!

The council meeting was...they all are probably going to die. I’d say half of that room will be dead by the end of 8x03. But don’t quote me because who the fuck knows? I sure as shit don’t...

Jonathan? Jonathan Snowflake? Where are you running off to, Jonathan? There is definitely trouble in paradise...

The best part of this whole episode was Tyrion, Jaime, Brienne, Podrick and Davos sitting around the fire. And it only got BETTER when Tormund showed up. I’d legit just watch a show with those six sitting around a fire riffing off each other and shooting the shit.

And Jaime knighting Brienne...my Braime heart. 😍❤️

Gendrya...ick. Do. Not. Want. Look, I love Gendrya but if I never have to see a half-naked Maisie Williams again it will be too soon. Not because she’s not beautiful (she is) but because I remember when she was TWELEVE on THIS show and...nope. Sorry, but nope. Also, it was kind of out of left field so...🤷🏽‍♀️

The ending montage was nice, I thought. I didn’t pick up on the shipper vibes like everyone else between Sansa and Theon. But let me talk about that for a minute...if they were to get together? GOOD FOR THEM! Not because I want to keep Sansa away from another ship (side-eyeing the dumbass Jonerice stans...and btw, y’all got your own mess to worry about hooooly shit) but because he’s the only person to ever straight up offer to fight FOR HER (not counting Brienne, but if we got Sansa/Brienne for real, I’d probably literally die my life would be complete).

I don’t think Theonsa is going to be a thing though. Cause I think Theon is gonna be wight food 😩😭

And finally the parentage reveal...wow. Sings aaaaaaalmooooost paaaaaradiiiiiiseeeee...but not quite. All I got to say is, Jonsa may very well not happen (I’ve never thought it would, personally, just thought it was possible) but all the same in The Who’s Been Right and Who’s Been Wrong stakes, I think we’re up to Jonsa 134224, Jonerys 0. So sad. Sorry, not sorry.

[wendynerdwrites]

For the record, I am NOT an Emilia Clarke stan AT ALL BUT

...Making fun of her for losing the Emmy is fucking asinine. Look, I’m not thrilled with some of the stuff she says either. I have made that clear. I was literally mocking something she said the other day. But she cherished the fuck out of Daenerys as a character and had that character destroyed. And anyone who wants to argue that the writing for Dany was good can eat my ass. I have made it very clear how I think Dany is nowhere near the hero people think she is, but I’m not going to pretend that the show didn’t make almost every wrong decision regarding her characterization for several seasons. The writing Emilia had for seasons assured her that she was playing an altruistic liberator and feminist icon. They left out almost all of the overtly questionable shit Dany did in the books and internal strife and then all the awful shit she did in the show was framed as “YAS QUEEN!” BS or didn’t have their actual implications and circumstances addressed at all. So yeah, I do kind of get where Clarke has been coming from. On top of that, they had Daenerys get murdered via embrace with her lover, had her “choose fear” over being spurned by a man, and had her replaced by an “emotionless” dude who was left out of an ENTIRE SEASON OF THE SHOW. So yes, sorry guys, but there was a TON of sexism surrounding Dany’s writing.

The whole show has been soaked in misogyny for a long ass time and Daenerys is no exception. Does it annoy me that Clarke was defending that bullshit until it was her character that went down? Sure. I totally think she says things that are questionable at best and are loaded with double standards. No question. But she fucking loved Daenerys for a lot of VERY good reasons. And she is hardly pulling her feelings from her ass. The fact that Daenerys was a feminist character screwed over by shitty, sexist writing is a pretty popular (and fairly defensible, to an extent) take, especially for show-only people. Thousands upon thousands of people agree with her and she is far from the only person saying such things, okay? So of COURSE she is going to add her voice to that discourse.

Is Dany’s storyline just sexism? Hell no. I’ve met many Dany stans who have admitted she is a tyrant well before season 8. But that doesn’t mean that she wasn’t an extremely important character and to pretend that Emilia Clarke, of all people, doesn’t have more reason than anyone (save for maybe GRRM) to be salty and unhappy about how she was written is absurd. And while it wasn’t “just” sexism, there was a shitload of it in there regardless.

I know some people are going to say, “Well, she can feel whatever she likes, but to say so publicly is unprofessional”. Alright, fine, but then you have to apply that same standard to Kit Harington calling the final season “Disappointing” and saying that his response to season 8 was to not even watch it. You have to apply that standard to Peter Dinklage mocking the shit out of D&D and season 8. You have to take Ian McElhinney to task for going public about how he literally wrote a letter to D&D back in season 4 about killing off Barristan. But no one does. I wonder what those other actors have in common.... hmmm...

Emilia Clarke was just given the scripts she was given. And she poured her heart and soul into that character. Daenerys Targaryen MADE HER as an actress. She spent a third of her damn lifespan playing Daenerys. Not just the scenes we saw on screen, but countless hours of multiple takes, filming deleted footage, rehearsing, table-reading, memorizing lines, costume fittings, makeup, effects work, screen tests, press, award shows... Imagine spending eight years of your life being told “YAS QUEEN! FEMINIST ICON!” doing all these iconic moments where your character frees slaves, makes grand speeches about destroying evil men and leading people, then in the final hour being told “BTW, your character is a mass-murdering psycho now. Go study speeches by the most evil men in history to rehearse.”

You think, with Clarke’s schedule, that she has time to consider all the implications and obvious consequences of everything Daenerys does? She doesn’t write or direct the show. She has to devote all her energy to portraying the character in the script. And she was doing this despite the fact that during the run of the show, her brain nearly exploded twice. Like, literally. She survived two aneurysms and had to undergo painful treatments and surgeries, had to process all of that trauma and then go back to work as if nothing was amiss.

So excuse her for maybe being pissed that the rug was ripped out from under her regarding a character she was so devoted to.

Talking about it does not warrant losing an Emmy. She wasn’t saying anything that countless other people weren’t. You don’t have to agree with her, but mocking her for it is fucking gross.

Also: The Emmy’s are complete horseshit. The actresses on GoT are ALWAYS shafted at them, and always have been. You want proof? Lena Headey, the best damn actor on the show (sorry Dinklage fans, but I feel like he got really tired of his character --- for very good reasons--- after season 5 and he seemed like he was sort of phoning it in in seasons 6-8. By the very high Dinklage standards, anyways. Not that he wasn’t good, he was, but not season 1-5 good. You could see his frustration with the writing on his face. Meanwhile Lena was consistent throughout the whole show, and I will put Cersei’s best moments up against Tyrion’s any day), has nothing. Lena Headey doesn’t have an Emmy for playing Cersei. You know what part of GoT DOES have Emmy’s? The episode with the line, “You want the good girl, but you need the bad pussy”, for writing. Seasons 5 and 8, for Best Drama. Consider that for several seconds. So pretending that the Emmy’s has anything to do with merit or “professionalism” is delusional AF.

I don’t find it funny that Emilia lost. Granted, I don’t really have strong feelings on her winning or losing, because seriously, fuck the Emmys (I also don’t have strong feelings about shows and actors I love like Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Fleabag, Alex Borstein and Phoebe Waller-Bridge winning because once again, fuck the Emmys). But I definitely have strong feelings about people mocking her for it. It’s stupid, unfair, and gross.

And for Sophie/Sansa stans joining in: Sophie lost too. And congratulations, you are now in the same league as people who make fun of Sophie over Dark Phoenix bombing. Feel good about yourselves?

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Jaime Lannister was Personally Victimized

and so was I. An essay. Subtitled how we were wronged, how he was wronged, how Brienne was wronged, how Braime was wronged, and how years of development was wronged. 

Let’s begin.

Now couple of things: I don’t read the books (plan to now.) so I’m just mostly going off the show and specifically this season, because this season had 2 Jaimes. This is probably not academically sound, or too terribly coherent, but I frankly just want to get my thoughts out there, because I was plump bamboozled with “The Bells.” Not just because it ruined so many seasons of juicy, believable, utterly transformative character development for my personal favorite GOT character, (and many others as well.) but considering the episodes that came before this one, it made zero sense. Because let me tell you, in 8 x 02, this lowkey Braime shipper was turned into major Braime shipper in the span of one hour, and I was literally made to believe they were endgame. Maybe not ride into the sunset with a bunch of kids on Tarth endgame, but made explicitly clear without a shadow of a doubt that Brienne was Jaime’s soulmate, true love...or whatever you want to call it.

All of this... all for this to culminate in him going back to Cersei. All for all those seasons of change for him to revert to season one, episode one, the things I do for love Jaime. From a storytelling perspective, there is no satisfaction. and it makes NO sense. Now of course D&D are all about “subversion,” but what was done to Jaime was not a witty or clever subversion of a redemption arc, but a complete and utter cancellation of all those years of hard work that they put in and that Nik put in, in order to get us to like Jaime. Jeremy Jahns in his review on YouTube said it best: Jaime Lannister was stabbed in the back. Furthermore, what they did to Jaime, (and let’s face it, he’s not the only one in this catastrophe that was personally victimized.) basically posits the really terrible message that “you can’t change your nature or where you came from or be different from your parents. (Which is what happened in Dany’s case. To be clear though, I think the signs were there for her, but it was poorly executed.) 

Either way, such a great message. What happened to Jaime also made no sense from a character perspective. Sure, Mr. I don’t care about innocents. ha. ha. ha. I also totally stabbed a guy in the back when I was 17 because he was going to kill innocents, thus giving me my name and eternal shame. Ha ha ha, look how consistent I am.

You’re not the Jaime Lannister that came to Winterfell. Jaime Lannister died in Brienne’s arms one night and a robot was sent in his place to go to Cersei.

Now this post won’t be talking about the major character inconsistencies (sure you don’t care about innocents Jaime SURE.) or go more into the terrible messages one can get out of this season (and Game of Thrones in general) or go into more detail about how subversion and spoiler culture is ruining good storytelling, but I will say that it reads to me that because such a common theory before Season 8 was that Jaime was going to kill Cersei, D&D thought to themselves hmmm better not do that because that’s what people expect, and in wanting to shock and surprise they invalidated his growth and development by making him die with her. Oh look, D&D. So clever. Yet in stroking your ego you gave the people that once trusted you a taste of ashes. Like...people figuring out where things are going to go is actually GOOD storytelling. 

More so though, this will focus on how the episodes before this one were framed and how the tone was set up. Because watching episode 2, 3, and most of 4...they made me believe Braime was endgame. They really did. Then they turn it around and make me expect it was always Cersei? 

Utter garbage. Jaime was wronged. So was Brienne. that’s another post though. (so is Missandei, and Dany... and heck we can actually talk about who WASN’T wronged this season.) But with the Kingslayer, let’s get started and discuss how everything, literally everything, was set up in favor of Jaime’s redemption and endgame with Brienne, all for it to get, quite literally, squished.

(sorry if that was a bad joke considering)

Now into the meat and potatoes. First of all, let’s talk about Jaime’s look this season. Is he even blonde anymore?

Both he and Tyrion, who symbolically abandoned the Lannister crest seasons ago, sure aren’t sporting that golden blonde look anymore. I mean Tyrion kind of is, but compared to Cersei:

it’s nowhere near it for both these boys. (heck, I would even argue Jaime starts to lose his signature Lannister look when he meets Brienne.) However, if Season 7 Jaime chooses to hide his golden hand, the Jaime that walked into Winterfell with darkish hair, beard, and cute bangs is really, really removed from his Lannister golden lion look. Furthermore, he even said in 8 x 02 his golden lion days are done. Now why. Tell me WHY we do these things in the costuming department all to send him right back to the lioness? WHY

Now I said I wasn’t going to talk about the terrible themes and messages D&D are positing with this season, but I do have to say that considering episode 4, with Jon talking to his sibling-cousins, and Sansa, Arya and Bran’s discussion about not trusting people, and then Jaime going back to Cersei...the writers are really out here saying that family is all that matters. Literally all. And sure, I love my family, I have a great family. But sometimes, like with Jaime and Cersei, families are toxic. Sometimes the bonds you make with others that aren’t your family are more meaningful than the ones you have with blood. Sam and Jon are like brothers even though they’re not related, and Jaime’s bond with Brienne was far, far more meaningful than with Cersei. It was Brienne, not Cersei that elevated him into wanting to be a better man.

But lol, guess not. it’s like what that one guy from Aladdin yells at Aladdin, “YOU WERE BORN A STREET RAT, YOU WILL DIE A STREET RAT” except with Jaime it’s “YOU WERE BORN A LANNISTER YOU WILL DIE A LANNISTER” except Jaime didn’t get an Aladdin moment where he proves the snooty prince wrong--he just regressed and left his Jasmine all alone crying.

Another thing: ignoring the awful character growth invalidation, if Jaime was going to go back to Cersei just to be with her (and not kill her/convince her to stop as a lot of us, including me, thought in 8 x 04), there just wasn’t enough buildup for him to make this change in episode 4 come “The Bells.” He was happy with Brienne, smiling with Tyrion, (above gif) then he gets news from Sansa and he’s like nah I better bounce? I could buy Jaime thinking he has to save Cersei at least for the sake of the baby, an innocent life. I can even buy Jaime with a guilt complex, thinking he doesn’t deserve his happiness with Bri and it’s in his place to be by her side because of family and the things Tywin used to tell him...IDK there’s a lot we could speculate. But I cannot buy that the same man who walked out on Cersei in season 7 and then STAY AT WINTERFELL FOR A MONTH WITH BRIENNE would just be like...in the span of literally five show minutes with no real good explanation go nah it’s always Cersei when he showed it WASN’T. Now call me crazy, but this could have, could have been done in a believable way if we had seen the spiral. but we needed more with Jaime and Brienne, more hints with maybe his struggling to be happy but being guilty and him realizing he did have a child on the way, wanting to do better for that baby than they did to the others. Just a kind of ambiguous glance at Brienne after a session of sex (after their first time, which he was very enthusiastic about BTW) isn’t enough to convey such a drastic one eighty, nor is him looking pensive after another night with Brienne. (and you know they totally had oathsex that night. Bri was naked it looked like and she came out in robe.) 

Now had this happened, I would have still hated it for the terrible message about “always go back to your toxic family,” but it would have played out much more like a Shakespearean tragedy than a random and giant middle finger to Jaime’s arc and Brienne’s character for the sake of a subversion. And heck, I could have forgiven this too if “The Bells” played out differently, and Jaime, realizing Cersei is too far gone, does what we always thought he would do.

*sigh* 

Now let’s talk about him and Brienne and how it was filmed/framed. Now either I’m just naive or a big sap (truth to those statements), but it seemed to me that Braime was purposely filmed as though they were the OTP of this final stretch of Game of Thrones. episode 2-half of 4? this disaster human was all BRIENNE BRIENNE BRIENNE. All for it to go CERSEI CERSEI CERSEI. 

Episode 2 Jaime and episode 5 are not the same person, at all.  FROM THE VERY BEGINNING in episode 2, this man looked at Brienne of Tarth like she was the sun,the stars, his everything, casting glances at her during the whole “trial scene.” Talking to Tyrion, he plump ignored him to stare longingly at Brienne from the ramparts. He knighted her with such beautiful ceremony, and the way they looked at each other after? 

A knighting? A marriage? both? 

these people all think they’re going to die, but instead of lamenting Cersei, “all that’s mattered” at least according to “the bells,” (LOL) Jaime Lannister wants to give Brienne of Tarth this beautiful act of love. and symbolically marry her And then he looks at her and he’s THAT devoted and such a smitten kitten.  

Episode 3. He never left her side during the whole battle. He saved her, then she saved him. Then this shot:

and the other shot of them, fighting side by side? this is literally a fic trope. 

Ok so then the oathsex happens but before it happens, there’s a shot of oathkeeper in Brienne’s room, AKA the symbol of their bond and their love. Then they do it, and I know some people have mixed feelings about it, but I personally liked how it happened, even loved how it happened. It was awkward. Jaime said “I don’t want things growing on me” (though he’s made it pretty clear someone has grown on him, great line.) He liked it when she took charge. He reminded her it was a first time for him too. And then they have a kiss that really, in my opinion, culminates the years of bickering and sexual tension. It was my personal favorite GOT sexy scene, because it felt so real. He sleeps with her and they live like lovers for a month. They ARE lovers for a month or so.

and then he leaves and that look he gave her? 

that was the look of a man who thought he had to give up on his beloved. Not a man who didn’t love this woman anymore. He’s defeated and broken but he is not not in love.

basically, all the clues (and just THIS SEASON) led to Brienne being his true love. Not Cersei. In Jaime choosing Cersei over the woman who he looked at like he saw the sun not only has made the writers make some really unfortunate implications about toxic relationships, but they’ve also said that people can’t change. They’ve completely disrespected Brienne in the process, making her seem like she was just a blip on his radar... when she wasn’t. She was so much more. 

Now maybe all along, Jaime’s arc was not a redemption arc, but choosing who you want to be. Well, if that’s the case, it’s also a bad message. Apparently to D&D you can never change, you’re always doomed to head right back to square one, right back to “the things you do for love” and your toxic roots. If that’s the case then all Brienne was this season was a dangling carrot, a oh look what Jaime could have had if he wasn’t so addicted to Cersei.... sad sad SUBVERSION too bad he’s an ADDICT though! 

there’s no empathy. No respect. 

I have a bad feeling Bri’s pregnant too. And if that’s the case...if all this woman was supposed to do this season was carry the baby of a man who broke her heart just so the wheel wouldn’t truly break? They’re going to make Brienne just a vessel for a baby, making that Jaime’s “redemption?”

so in conclusion: I was not only infuriated because D&D invalidated so much growth in favor of witty subversion that’s not witty and actually tastes like ashes and proports a toxic message, but what was done tonally made no sense, because Braime was filmed like they were “right.” They also wrote a Jaime that’s more akin to Season One Episode One Jaime, and not the one that came to Winterfell because he made a promise.  

I have almost no hope he is alive, D&D said so... but hey stranger things have happened. Nik is being quiet and hasn’t said goodbye to his character like everyone else has whose died already, but maybe he’s just salty/had time to process what happened/just busy right now/ waiting until the last episode to make a final statement. I mean this guy is kind of a troll, but he’s a classy dude and did an amazing job. But if it’s true, if Jaime’s end was to die under a rock, to go deeper and kinda soften this, I do think the Jaime that “died,” wasn’t a Jaime that romantically wanted Cersei, but a Jaime who loved her, finally, like an actual brother and not...the stuff before. There was no kiss, just an embrace. Someone trying to make an ending not so scary. 

either way, I never expected or even wanted Jaime to survive Game of thrones until it freaking looked like that he was for a hot minute and get that good sweet ending with the one woman who he truly loved. But if he died,I wanted something better than what he got. I wanted Jaime to die as someone who did do something for love, but for a love that wasn’t a destructive one, or a regressive one. Not the same love as season one episode one, but a transformative love. Someone who did the right thing. For someone who made such an impact on so many people, he deserved better. 

And I hear rhetoric from some, mostly not on tumblr, that I should  have expected a fan favorite character like Jaime to get a shitty end, because GOT is about subversion. But GOT, above all, has to succeed as a satisfying story for the thing as a whole, and for the characters. It has to make sense. This makes NO sense. And Jaime, such an important character in the mythos, shouldn’t go out like that. Neither should Cersei TBH. She deserved more than standing by a window. 

George. Give Jaime better. Please. Not necessarily a ride into the sunset ending with the one who transformed him, but one where he knows he’s a better person and has been transformed. One where he knows he’s changed for the better.

*peace*

[ladyalice101]

Just read your fic "you gave all you had (and now i am whole)" on AO3 (I'm KaisaSegher there, btw) and let me just say it was amazing! I'm sorry if I'm repeating myself here, but it truly was. Thank goodness we have people like you to fix the mess D&D made, really. THIS is what should have happened, at some point. Heck, in my mind it will. What are your thoughts on the finale? Any favourite headcanons you'd like to share? Anyway, keep your amazing work! Big hug

ok ok ok i just typed this huge ass response to this and tumblr has swallowed it and deposited it in the aether, but i will retype though perhaps more briefly haha. 

so firstly, THANK YOU. you aren’t repeating yourself but even if you were i would still LOVE this bc you went to the effort to not only tell me you loved it once, but TWICE. you’re so kind and you have no idea how much it means to me. truly, thank you. 

so the finale - i dont have much to say that hasn’t already been said, but i still will answer! 

my biggest issue is that there was no release of tension. we spent 8 season with these protagonists, with their hopes and dreams, and not a single one of them got what they wanted. 

jon wanted to find a place to belong - i would argue he found that with sansa, though i know others disagree. some probably say that he found a place amongst the wildlings (and yes i do think this is true on some level), and i could probably be happier about jon’s ending being north of the wall if not for the way they framed it. we have a montage of jon getting back to castle black (the place he left bc he was fucking MURDERED there), and then we have him ride out north of the wall with sad music playing behind (notably jon doesn’t smile ONCE), and the camera is positioned inside the wall as the gate closes on jon, who is looking back over his shoulder, signifying that jon can’t go south again and he’s really upset about it. maybe if he smiled a bit. a quirk of his lips as the gate closed, or as he rode into the forest. but no. nope.

sorry, but i really can’t find it in myself to find that ‘sweet’ in any way. it’s just straight up bitter. it’s just straight up sad. 

sansa - my girl deserved to get agency over herself, and that’s why i like her being queen. the north deserved a queen as good as sansa. but? where is the personal fulfilment? sansa’s entire arc was about her romantic naiveté being ripped from her, so where was the full circle moment where she realises that life isn’t hopeless? where she and we get the fulfilment of realising that she was right all along, that there is magic is falling in love and being loved. 

so like cool she was ‘trained’ to be queen and she is, but that’s not what her arc was about and to reduce it to that is upsetting. 

i won’t get in to arya and bran - bc i’d just be repeating myself with the whole ‘they should be with family like they all fought for for 8 seasons’, or repeating other’s who have articulated the problems much better. 

but they tried to sell us some whack bs this season man.

life isn’t shit and then you die and it’s fucked up that they tried to tell us that it is. 

oh no, of course, i’m forgetting the two characters who deserved to get the happy endings that they did - tyrion and bronn! those two did such great things in the show and they deserved to be the only two were rewarded with everything they ever wanted! 

ha. ha ha ha. i’m going to cry myself to sleep. 

so why does this matter so much to me? 

when i first started watching got, my personal life was extremely different to what it is now. that’s to be expected, of course, because it’s been four years. i won’t go in to TOO much detail, bc shit’s about to get really fucking personal even though you didn’t ask hahaha, but earlier this year i was diagnosed with a genetic mutation called BRCA1 which basically means that my lifetime chance of getting breast cancer is 80% (it’s 12% for other women) and 40% for ovarian cancer (which, from memory, is 2% for other women). so my chance are pretty high. i got tested bc my mum got breast cancer late last year, and we have a family history, so she was tested for the BRCA1 mutation and was found positive. i decided to get tested, too. (my mum just finished treatment last month and it’s looking really good for her, thank GOD).

god do i know that this is not the worst thing that i could have been diagnosed with but i’m only 21 and i have to get 6 monthly clinical exams and scans done. by the time i’m 30 i’ll probably have had to have gotten a double mastectomy, and by the time i’m 40 i have to have had all my reproductive organs removed - ovaries, fallopian tubes, uterus, all of it. 

so. i’m 21. i’m single, and quite a romantic. i don’t expect to have found my life partner in the next few years, and i expect even less to be married by the time i’m 30. i’m facing the very real possibility of not being able to carry my own child, of not being able to breastfeed any child i do have. 

sure, not the worst, but it’s not great - but what does it do to my romantic prospects? at worst, it would turn men away (not that i’d want those weakass men that can’t see past that but you get the point), at best it would likely create some tension at some point. 

and do you know what got taught me this year? 

that life is shit and then you die. 

so amidst all of that fucking bullshit in my life, game of thrones s8 barged in and told me that the characters that i identify with (the sansa’s, the jon’s) they don’t get a happily ever after, despite what they hope for, what they want. they sacrifice everything, they go through all of that bullshit, just to never fall in love, just to be punished for doing the right thing. 

now maybe you read all of that and you’re like “oh that’s sad about the brca thing but i dont see what that has to do with got and maybe you should seperate them and move on” like most people in my life have told me. and trust me, one day i probably will. i want to now, but unfortunately i can’t. 

and that’s what upset me. media isn’t supposed to do that, isn’t supposed to make you so upset about your own life. they can claim realism all they want, but if they wanted to be realistic they wouldn’t have fucking thrown out arcs and stories and people having like actual consequences for their actions. realism is not just ‘there are no happy endings in real life’.  

so, in conclusion, game of thrones ruined my life. haha nah, but, really? they couldn’t have given us some sweet with that bitter? 

anyway. WHOO. that’s a long ass reply. as for headcanons - i don’t really have much tbh but if i think of some i’ll put them in a post. if there’s headcanons around a specific thing you want to see, then send me a message/ask bc you’ll probably prompt my imagination and i want to give you everything. 

otherwise thank you SO much for reading my story and this reply! xxx 

[fedonciadale]

How do you interpret Jon’s silence when Sansa asked him for forgiveness in the end? I found it disappointing and uncalled for. Thank you for everything you have done for this fandom btw. I’m sorry we couldn’t get that ending we wanted, but I know in my heart it would have been the perfect ending to both Sansa and S1-6 Jon.

Dear nonny, Originally I also understood this as Sansa asking for forgiveness for telling about the fact that she revealed RLJ to Tyrion, and I was pissed, because of anything Jon should ask for Sansa’s forgiveness because she was right (as always) and Jon was wrong.Now I interprete it differently. Sansa and Jon might see each other for the last time (they certainly filmed it that way) and Sansa wants to leave on good terms more than anything. I think ‘Can you forgive me’ means 'I am so sorry that I could not pull you out of this. I am so sorry that you had to suffer through this. I am sorry that I could not help you. I am sorry you’re a broken man now.’ I think she desperately wants to reach Jon and therefore she calls back to the time they reunited. I don’t think she is convinced that she did something wrong that needs forgiveness, she tries to find words that make Jon react. Notice how she moves in for a hug after that, before waiting if he says anything. And Jon is at first too numb to reciproce. He clearly suffers detachment and PTSD - I think he feels very guilty about King’s Landing which we saw at the end of episode 5. But with Sansa in his arms, the ice he put around his heart shatters and we see him pulling her close and breathing her in, finally he feels again. That is Sansa’s power. She gets behind his armour, she reminds him of what maybe was the happiest moment in both their lives : their reunion at Castle Black. It hurts him, but it is as if feeling has returned to him. Maybe he will heal.I realise I almost turned this into a fic… Maybe I’ll do a drabble on this after all….Thanks for the ask and the compliment! And yes Jon and Sansa would have been a perfect ending. I think all we ever get is unspoken feelings and 'what could have been', but it is just the best ship!

[adecila]

Hi. Are you going to do the 2nd ep preview post? I would like to read your opinion.

Hi anon, thank you for being so patient. I watched the promo a bunch of times and I also saw the stills from the episode. Now, in case you avoid spoilers, I am not saying I have them, but I am not sure which information was confirmed by the show runners in interviews by now. I don’t count trailers, promo pics and still as spoilers. If the information comes from an interview, trailer or other official sources, it ain’t a spoiler. 

Moving on..

1. Jaime vs Dany ... 

I have seen some people are talking about Jaime’s trial in episode 2 but I was very confused. I was telling a few friends last night - nowhere have I seen it confirmed. I think someone speculated Jaime is on trial and the entire fandom ran with it. Happens a lot. No, we haven’t had any confirmation this is a trial. And I know people think this is the case because he is standing, you have armed guards behind him somewhere, you get a Dany table and a Jon table... well... no. I disagree. 

Is this meant to somehow parallel the Tyrion trial(s)? No... I don’t think so. Mind you, Jaime is not in chains. This to me looks a lot like a petitioner to the court would be received. You have the monarch (in this case the alliance - Dany in the middle, flanked by Jon and S.nsa), and then you have the rest of the court. Plus, it has been established the North side doesn’t like the Dany side, hence the two tables, hence they sit separately since the Northern Lords are like YoU cAn’T SiT WiTh Us. The guards would and should be there by default. Jaime is standing because he is addressing the Ruler. 

Keep in mind, the previous episode finished with Jaime arriving in incognito mode in WF. Maybe Bran calls the guards and Jaime is taken into the Great Hall to explain himself - not only is he arriving in non Lannister colours, he is also arriving by himself. He’s got some explaining to do, since last these people have met, he was to march to Winterfell with an army to aid in the fight against the Army of the dead. 

About Dany’s discourse - Dany and Jaime haven’t officially met. He tried killing her on the Field of Fire 2.0 and he almost got roasted by her baby Drogon (*pets* the best son ever). They also crossed paths in the Dragon Pit Summit (LMAO idk why I am calling it that; I guess it’s because fake truce or armistice is too much; oooooh let’s call it a parley). But they haven’t actually spoken. And Dany has some things to say to the man who killed her father. In my opinion (but who the fuck knows anymore since the writing is killing me and after episode 1 I have so little faith), Dany will have her Queen mask on, she is angry because quite frankly WHERE THE FUCK IS THE ARMY BITCH. Like ofc this means Cersei betrayed them, you don’t need a genius (*cough* S.. *cough*) to tell you that if he is travelling low key and alone. 

Dany needs closure. She will probably tell Jaime - listen, my brother told me all about you; because you killed my dad we had to flee; because you killed my dad we were poor and starving and on the run; the only thing that made us keep going was fantasising about all the ways we would kill you to avenge our father. I don’t blame them, tbh, it’s quite normal, considering what Viserys was feeding her. But! Dany knows now that Viserys was lying; that her father was a mad man. She knows this from Barristan Selmy. So I am REALLY hoping that heavy and meaningful speech that is making Jaime shit his pants (fo real look at his face lmao someone gif it pls) and Tyrion to look 10 years older is ending in something along the lines of “My daddy was cray cray; you did good; you can live; but try to kill me again and you die.” 

Why? Because it makes sense, and because we have seen Jaime fighting in the trailer, so we know he survives this meeting. 

On the other hands, the Starks also have beef with Jaime fookin Lannister - honestly get in line. 

Now... do I think Bran Starkashian the drama queen (present at the meeting) will drop the bomb that Jaime pushed him out the window? Hmmm... I cannot make up my mind. My issue is that if he does, then it’s gonna create more drama, and after episode 1 I think the writers can bring it up and just gloss over it (ugh remember how they dropped the Viserion is a wight news?). But, I also think that since Bran isn’t Bran anymore, then what does this matter to him? If this were still Bran, sure I could have seen a point in revealing it. They could also just do a Bran vs Jaime scene in which Jaime goes to apologise and Bran just says some trippy shit. 

2. S.ansa vs Dany in the Library (sitting in a tree K-I-.. neah we’re not there yet)

So, as it’s framed, I am guessing Sansa says something to Jaime, hence the look Dany has on her face at the table in the Great Hall - must be something surprising. Then I guess we get their private meeting over how y’all bitches should have never trusted Cersei. I guess S.ansa is at least directly talking to Dany not instead of, ya know, AT HER or ABOUT HER. We also have a still with a fake Dany smile, but I am hoping for some meaningful dialogue here. Dany and S.ansa have quite a lot in common so I really want some meaningful chat here so we can move the fuck on from the train wreck that was the episode 1 welcome. Will this be the episode the writers let S.ansa actually use her brain? We’ll see in 80-ish hours. 

3. Jorah x Varys x Tyrion and then some Sam and some Gilly stills 

I think this is either before or after a joint small council meeting. But since Dany is in her white outside coat again, then it must be after Tormund x Edd arrive. They look intense so maybe it’s more likely afterwards. Maybe something happens in that meeting. 

Also the stills of Jon x Arya and the one of Sam x Jon look from the same place. Sam’s intense look shows me that he might have some residual tension with Jon after that shit reveal. Jondry 5eva.  

The still of Sam x Gilly x Little Sam on the bed is so cuuuute. I hope this is post the crypt discussion with Jon and it’s when GIlly knocks some sense into it. Alternatively, it can be the night before the war for some more extra feels. 

4.  The Forge x Arya 

Guessing Arya is going to Gendry to pick up her new weapon and to deliver her Many Faces speech. Is she saying it to Gendry? I think so. Guess this is also where we gonna see sexy Gendry hehe *Gendrya intensifies*

5. And then it gets weird to me... two battle scenes? MAYBE? WHO THE HELL KNOWS ANYMORE

When I first saw the troops moving in the day, I said cool beans, so maybe preparations. But then I see a catapult going off during the day? And more stress? And more people moving. Tormund x Edd arrive during the day too. And we know they are technically behind the dead, since Last Hearth, where Ned Umber was supposed to be was already passed by the dead (since we got the message) so they can’t be arriving before the dead, can they? So how come they arrive and deliver a “they are coming message” and Jon asks how long do they have? How can they be moving faster than the dead? These aren’t slow zombies and Tormund x Edd don’t have a snowmobile laying around. Do they? 

But then you have night battle scenes or rather preparations: Missandei x Grey Worm kiss, Jorah with Heartsbane I hope (I hope this is Sam’s token of I have been a shitty boy to your Queen pls say sorry), Arya with a bow (I am so turned on btw), Jorah riding with the Dothraki, Tyrion on the battlements, Jon on the battlements, Lyanna Mormont in armour!!!! So something is happening as night too. Is this a continuation from the day prep? Is this something else entirely? Then why fire the catapult? Is it a test? Am I overanalysing? Certainly. 

What is sure though is that we won’t get a battle this episode, we will get the build up to it and everything in between. 

6. Jonerys in the crypts 

Ah again some actual leak info I have from when Friki was still allowed to talk (nothing new, just something he has already said), but I’d rather say in a different post. So this is clearly not following the Sam x Jon chat, since here Jon has his furs, and Dany is dressed again in her outside white fur coat. My bet is this is just before the battle, and Jon went to pay his respects to his dad (and mom?) one last time, because he is an emo sad boy. 

Is this about the reveal? Hmmm not so sure. It is very reminiscent of the Dragon Pit when Jon was sad he had fucked up with Cersei and Dany went to console him. Maybe this is post small council and Dany also goes to console him (she is wearing the white coat there). 

7. More small stuff from the stills that we didn’t get from the promo

Tyrion drinking in front of a fire - maybe he is with Bran, since he is also pictured close/next to a hearth. 

Sansa eating - she could be in the Great Hall. She looks quite relaxed so idk maybe this is in a more informal setting. Maybe it’s the same as the one with Tyrion. 

Bran in front of the Heart Tree during the day - I am hoping one more vision. Maybe this is before Tormund x Edd arrive? Or after? Is Bran trying to see the NK again? 

Gilly outside - maybe she is talking to Davos who seems to be in similar setting in a different still? 

I think I might have skipped some stuff, but feel free to ask :)

I have quite high hopes for this episode. I am hoping it will end the fucking drama once and for all and I am hoping they let Dany speak for herself more, since she was really toning it down in episode 1, in hopes of appeasing the North. But since that didn’t work, I am so fucking ready to see the Dany we know and love. The Queen we chose.