daenerysies - Tumblr blog

[daenerysies]

The idea that it is somehow "bad writing" if rhaenyra has a better character than aegon imo is fundamentally misunderstanding the point of the conflict

The dance is not about two completely equal factions where you choose the one you prefer ro root for like a sport's match... the point is that rhaenyra's succession as the by far eldest child was set in stone by viserys, and yet people argue and doubt it and want to depose her exclusively on account of her gender; if she had been a man noone would even be having this discussion

The point is that even if Aegon is a s*x pest and not qualified and never even wanted to be king anyways people will still think he somehow is the one deserving of the throne over rhaenyra and call him the only valid king of this conflict in the annals of history, for no other reason than that he was the firstborn male child of viserys

And for sure Rhaenyra and her faction will do their own share of war crimes in the future once everyone starts playing dirty, but it is important that she is presented as just a normal person in the beginning; her succession is not doubted because she is uniquely bad of character, it is doubted because she breaks centuries of patriarchal tradition

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it was uncomfortable to watch laena burn herself to death while knowing she did not in the book and while i can seperate the book and the show it feels weird to have made her a black woman but to give her a much more horrific death and life in general

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deep diving into the episode three line from rhaenyra, “no one is here for me,” and how if the takeaway from that scene is that rhaenyra is a selfish brat you aren’t proficient enough to do anything past surface-level reading.

in episode one rhaenyra expresses to alicent that she hopes her father gets his son, “for as long as i can recall it’s all he’s wanted.” which leads us (the audience) to understand that while rhaenyra loves both of her parents she feels ostracized from her father (and mayhaps even her mother, to some extent, because of her constant pregnancies) due to his ‘need’ for a son to continue the targaryen dynasty. she is a daughter, only seen as valuable for her womb, which is evidenced that she knows about when talking to her mother. rhaenyra wishes to be a knight and ride off to battle and glory, with aemma giving her a gentle reality check on her lot in life. she does not want to serve the same purpose as her mother.

aemma dies near the end of the episode, with viserys ordering her butchered for the chance that his long-awaited male heir might live. this is a violent and gruesome scene, followed by rhaenyra not even being given the privilege of hearing her mother’s death first. she is instead relegated to members of the small council being alerted, even corlys and rhaenys learning about this before her, she is a silent member on the sidelines. she does not know the extent of what has happened, but she knows that something is wrong.

we have to think about how she learns of her mother’s fate. did otto tell her? did rhaenys? did viserys? did she see her mother’s body ripped open? did she see the bloody sheets left at the scene? was she allowed to hold baby baelon, considering he didn’t die immediately? was she there when he took his last breath? maybe it would bring her some comfort, she didn’t get to say goodbye to her mom. maybe she held him until he passed. did her father offer any explanation? we’ll never know, but these are all such heavy questions in regards to what she experienced that day. she’s fourteen, has spent her entire life watching her mother grieve dead baby after dead baby, losing little bits of herself in the process. it’s no wonder this was a traumatizing period for her, fueling her want (her need) to not be shackled down by marriage and childbirth.

even at her mother and brother’s funeral she isn’t allowed to just grieve, to just be. she has to hold her head high, she has to comfort her father, she has to order their corpses burned. was her father happy for the few hours he had a son? she wouldn’t know, she never will be that for him. how long does he spend wallowing is his self pity? he admonishes daemon for not being there for his niece, but where was he, her father? he banishes daemon, takes comfort from his daughter’s best friend. he finally comes to her, tells her of a great danger rising from the north; from my blood comes the prince that was promised, his will be the song of ice and fire. she hasn’t heard from him in days, a targaryen must be seated on the iron throne to unite the realm against the cold and the dark. her mother is dead, and he has wasted the years since she was born wanting a son. she is now enough, her mother never was.

it has now been six months since her mother's death (murder), and she has been heir the *entire* time. her father won't talk to her, she is still the cupbearer for the small council. lord corlys is angry about a war he says has cost him, the crown will not help. she suggests they use dragons, a show of force against their enemies. her father admonishes her, "it isn't that simple, rhaenyra." he allows the lords at the table to belittle her efforts. the only one appreciative is corlys, "at least the princess has a plan." otto says there are better uses for her talents, she has been heir to the iron throne for six months. she's been given the chance to choose a future kingsguard, she wants one with actual combat experience. the hand is exacerbated, she is firm in her decision. ser criston cole will be the replacement for ser ryam redwyne.

alicent has been visiting her father in his private chambers secretly, corlys wants his daughter to be the next queen. viserys begins openly courting lady laena of house velaryon. rhaenyra and alicent visit the sept, she expresses her worry, her mother has only dead for half a year. the lords seek to replace her, alicent convinces her that she cannot worry about the plots of lords and men, she is the heir, however. why shouldn't she worry? she misses her mother.

she meets with her father, he reassures her, "i loved your mother very much." she apologizes for speaking out of turn at the small council meeting, he tells her she will learn (will he be the one to teach her, though?) daemon has taken a dragon's egg and seized dragonstone, bringing news of his future marriage to lady mysaria. the king means to go himself to stop him, otto will not let him. daemon took baelon's egg. rhaenyra is angry. she reaches dragonstone just after otto's party, she knows they were about to come to blows. she confronts daemon, she is the reason he was disinherited. if he kills her, he'd be done with all this bother. daemon scoffs, walking away from her. he throws the egg whilst still retreating. rhaenyra smiles and leaves. her father is mad once he learns what she's done. she left without his permission, but she retrieved the egg and prevented bloodshed, he should be pleased with her efforts. otto would never have been able to accomplish what she did, he relents.

rhaenys lectures her about the order of things. the realm will never accept a woman ascending the iron throne, but it's different for her. her father is the king, rhaenys' father dies as a prince. her father made the lords of the realm swear obeisance to her, rhaenys never had such a thing. the lords chose viserys over rhaenys at the great council, viserys has not given them a choice. rhaenys is the the queen who never was, rhaenyra is the queen to be. when she is queen she will create a new order, rhaenys warns there will be war (unfortunately she is right).

another meeting takes place between father and daughter. he must take a new wife, someone to help propagate the targaryen line. they are vulerable, to easily ended. rhaenyra understands, it is his duty as king. obviously he will marry laena, the daughter of one of the most powerful houses in the realm and of pure valyrian stock, it is a fine match. alicent is still visiting her father in secret.

her father calls a small council meeting, he means to announce his next wife. rhaenyra is ready, she gave him her blessing (why is alicent here? she never has been before.) her father starts speaking, "i intend to marry... the lady alicent hightower." corlys is enraged, otto is pleased, alicent is anxious. rhaenyra was ready, it has all fallen apart. alicent is her best friend, that friendship dies before her very eyes. she runs from the room.

it has been two years. viserys and alicent are married, and they have a son, with one more baby on the way. the boy's name is aegon, it is his second birthday. he has past his infancy, the lords believe it is only a matter of time until the king names him heir, rhaenyra is well aware of this. the queen visits the godswood where rhaenyra sits. she overrides rhaenyra's authority, commanding the singer to leave. she states the king wishes for her to join them, he wants them to have fun as a family. they do not need her to celebrate his long-awaited son. it is the king's command, she leaves unhappily. alicent wishes for things to be different, rhaenyra knows they never can be.

together they all sit, traveling towards the kingswood. rhaenyra asks after alicent's well-being, viserys reminds her that she will be in this position sooner than late (the same position that killed her mother). "it isn't so bad, the days are long but aegon came quickly and without fuss." the queen states. rhaenyra is hurt, she tries not to show it. the king reminds her she has duties, rhaenyra retorts sarcastically. how long will these duties last, once her father names alicent's son as heir over her? her life will be forfeit before long. no one is here for her.

"no one is here for me." translates to "no one has been here for me. i’ve been alone and angry and terrified for years. i am my father’s heir, but what does that mean? what will it cost? you put me here. daemon put me here. alicent put me here. you have a son now, he outlived baelon and my other siblings. how long until i am cast aside again? made to be some petty lord's wife, made to be a broodmare until it kills me? i don't want to end up like my mother. this heirship is all i have. it will soon no longer be mine. i'm only seventeen. no one is here for me."

rhaenyra is never shown the same amount of grace as alicent for her strifes and anguish in life, for the fact that she too was a child from episodes one through five. rhaenyra might not have been a child bride, but she still spent her life being told she was never enough. she was not a boy, she could not be the heir, her father needed an heir. he kills her mother for it, he ignores her unless she can benefit him. he makes her believe that he will marry laena, only to blindside her by marrying alicent. she realizes alicent has been lying to her for months. her father continues to undermine her throughout the years. he names her heir to spite daemon, which she admits she knows about in episode two. he allows the lords to ignore her. it takes him two years to reassure her he won't replace her. rhaenyra is an angsty teen who has seemingly lost everything and has no support to counter that. she is not upset that no one showed up to a two-year-olds birthday party with her in mind, she is upset that her father continuously overlooks her, that he takes and takes and takes everything from her. he took her mother, he took daemon, he took alicent, he had a son. she has not been able to catch a break due to her father's selfishness. in all honesty, she should have acted out worse, maybe burn everything to the ground. viserys would deserve it, she was far too lenient with him.

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See? You're not the only one who's clever.

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The Prince That Was Promised

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People holding the "How romantic it must be, to be imprisoned in a castle and made to squeeze out heirs" against Rhaenyra are... reaching.

First of all, the MOMENT she noticed Alicent's expression has fallen, she makes an apology. She holds Alicent's hand and gives her a softer look- because she didn't mean for her malcontent to harm someone, she was simply trying to express why she was so disillusioned she was with her courtship.

Yall forget that at this point, Rhaenyra and Alicent are still fully estranged. Alicent never told Rhaenyra that her meetings with and marriage to Viserys were her fathers plot. To Rhaenyras point of view, it was her best friend, who had only just before, dismissed Rhaenyras concerns of plots to remarry her father and supplant her (Alicent literally tells the NAMED HEIR that it isn't her place to question the plots of men. When it very much ENTIRELY is her place- as Rhaenyra proves when she settles the Dragonstone conflict without bloodshed or battle, in a way Otto could have NEVER accomplished.)- all whilst **being a part of one of those plots.** and we only see Viserys telling Alicent not to tell Rhaenyra after *six months* of meetings like that have passed. To Rhaenyra this looks like Alicent being a scheming traitor, like many people probably proved to be through her life- only caring about her in how they could use her to elevate themselves. And this was her best friend. The girl she studied with, the girl who comforted her after the loss of her mother, the girl who helped to give her strength before she was was named heir, the girl she wanted to fly across the skies with. She felt betrayed, and from her perspective, she has every right to feel so. (And she does)

Then for three years, Rhaenyra tried to have space from the people she felt had broken her trust, tried to act as heir and also to avoid marriage due to the terror of what happened to her mother. She isnt disrespectful or vitriolic in any scene we see- she just wants to be left alone to read books and listen to music, to continue to try and be heir even if she sees Ottos writing on the wall. And every opportunity they get, Viserys AND Alicent refuse to allow her that space. And we know from ep.2 that Otto likely took every opportunity he had to undermine her efforts as heir.

Alicent then has the boy that Rhaenyras mother was slaughtered for, and Rhaenyra is made to witness how the realm salivates for a child to replace her as heir all because of his genitalia. Hiw hard she has tried, whatever she has done or accomplished doesn't matter to the realm. Only her sex. At Aegons name day, Hobart Hightower calls Aegon 'second of his name' and 'the conqueror babe' literally SAYING how the realm sees him as their future king already- and no one does or says anything to correct him.

So her relationship with Alicent is strained. And Rhaenyra doesn't even know what we know as the audience, that Otto is actively whispering treason and conspiracy to Alicent and she at no point warns Rhaenyra or Viserys.

Furthermore, Alicent DID make the comment in the carriage on the way to the hunt of Aegons quick birth. I highly doubt she meant for that comment to come across as it did, but it doesn't change that the comment was a slap in Rhaenyras face, to the point even the maids looked judgemental. And there was no apology or effort made to soothe that sting.

Anyways.

Rhaenyra returns from her courtship tour, and Alicent approaches her. They have perhaps the first gentle moment between them that they've had in years. Alicent expresses how romantic she feels the tour was.

Rhaenyra, who has the pressure of having to choose correctly- because choosing wrong could result in a husband who uses her as a broodmare as her mother was, or in a man who only wishes to use her so that he can have power over the throne, who wishes to use her to elevate himself and would hope to use Westeros' patriarchal traditions to make her his puppet queen. And the options we are shown are.. a man old enough to have met her great grandmother, a child, and a slightly older snob of a boy who is promptly slain for insulting the child. Reminder, that Daemon was not an option, nor was Harwin, who Viserys mocked as an option in ep.3. Rhaenyra KNOWS these men only want her for her blood and the throne and she expresses her frustration with it. She expresses that the tour is anything but romantic- none of these men love her. None of them care for *her.* only her power. Only her blood.

And the MOMENT she realizes her comment hurt Alicent, she attempts to make amends.

Yall will do ANYTHING to make her seem like this spoiled rotten, nasty princess.... except pay attention to context and the reality of Rhaenyras position and nature.

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really really fun watching a modern audience resort to the same gendered insults medieval nobility characters use to tarnish and ruin women’s reputations. there is one woman who seems to suffer the most from these terms being thrown around, and it usually takes place to condemn her for various crimes; top of which include her being born a woman, her daring to want her birthright, along with the most heinous of crimes: having brown haired children.

not to mention that part of the reason these… lack of brain juice individuals feel so comfortable saying them is because the show runners decided that the *true* victim of the dance couldn’t be the targaryen woman who is headed as the protagonist of this specific time period in targaryen history, instead it needed to be her psychologically abusive auburn-haired stepmother. i see exactly through this ruse they attempted to intertwine into the show by having RHAENYRA be the one to levy ‘whore’ at alicent, rather than the other way around like in canon. not slick behavior in the slightest.

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Sixty ASOIAF!Dany moments that deserve more appreciation from the fandom - Her intelligence (8/60): Daenerys outlining the battle plan to defeat the Yunkish slavers, which is accepted by more experienced advisors with no objections and leads to her side’s victory against the masters. The plan displays Dany’s knowledge of a) the Yunkish forces’ tactical formation, b) the local terrain and topography of the area and c) the Unsullied and her khalasar’s strengths and how to use them in battle, as well as her ability to deceive her enemies in a surprise attack because she’s a Guile Hero

“An hour past midnight should be time enough.”

“Yes, Khaleesi,” said Rakharo. “Time for what?”

“To mount our attack.”

Ser Jorah Mormont scowled. “You told the sellswords—”

“—that I wanted their answers on the morrow. I made no promises about tonight. The Stormcrows will be arguing about my offer. The Second Sons will be drunk on the wine I gave Mero. And the Yunkai’i believe they have three days. We will take them under cover of this darkness.”

“They will have scouts watching for us.”

“And in the dark, they will see hundreds of campfires burning,” said Dany. “If they see anything at all.”

“Khaleesi,” said Jhogo, “I will deal with these scouts. They are no riders, only slavers on horses.”

“Just so,” she agreed. “I think we should attack from three sides. Grey Worm, your Unsullied shall strike at them from right and left, while my kos lead my horse in wedge for a thrust through their center. Slave soldiers will never stand before mounted Dothraki.” She smiled. “To be sure, I am only a young girl and know little of war. What do you think, my lords?”

“I think you are Rhaegar Targaryen’s sister,” Ser Jorah said with a rueful half smile. 

“Aye,” said Arstan Whitebeard, “and a queen as well.” 

[…]  “Your Grace, I bring you victory. The Stormcrows turned their cloaks, the slaves broke, and the Second Sons were too drunk to fight, just as you said. Two hundred dead, Yunkai’i for the most part. Their slaves threw down their spears and ran, and their sellswords yielded. We have several thousand captives.” (ASOS Daenerys IV)

List of passages showcasing ASOIAF!Dany’s intelligence

Lists of passages showcasing key aspects of ASOIAF!Dany’s characterization

List of prompts for the upcoming Dany appreciation month

Bonus:

On HBO, the show writers created a new strategy to give show!Daario the credit for defeating Yunkai and even went as far as to have him take show!Dany’s hand so she could find the spot on the city’s map that he was referring to:

This is quite a frustrating regression compared to her book counterpart being a good strategist who knows enough about the area to decide how and from where her troops should attack. It says a lot about how D&D never understood Dany’s character and, like most of the fandom, constantly underestimated her intelligence and skills.

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The Stallion Who Mounts The World

Inspired by Viktor Vasnetsov's painting The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

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RHAENYRA TARGARYEN

“The singers dubbed her the Realm’s Delight, for she was bright and precocious—a beautiful child who was already a dragonrider at the age of seven as she flew on the back of her she-dragon Syrax, named for one of the old gods of Valyria.”

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watching a certain… green character’s (🤨) stan claim that they aren’t able to have conversations about rhaenyra’s character flaws without being jumped while simultaneously stating that their fellow stans are the only ones capable of doing exactly that is so fucking funny.

when rhaenyra’s flaws are brought up these same people jump right into using her having bastards, her being a whore, her being groomed, her being a mary sue/self-insert (even more hilarious considering mary sues are known for their perfectness, but i digress), her being an apparent rapist??? these arguments are never made in good faith, and usually are a gateway into antis being even more openly misogynistic. they’re also neither flaws nor supported by the show/original text/even the horrible producers for house of the dragon.

i will not listen to you, and you do not deserve to be listened to if this is your line of thinking.

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“the dance isn’t about misogyny” one, if rhaenyra had been born with a dick the dance would have effectively been prevented (or at least stalled). male!rhaenyra would be seen as the undisputed heir to the throne, and if viserys still ends up marrying alicent (but this is an IF situation because aemma might not even die if v has no reason to keep pushing her for a male heir) the *only* excuse she would have to help usurp the throne is for her own want of power. the ‘my children will be in danger!’ line will not work and no one (besides maybe a few upstarts) will back her.

two, aegon had the chance to name a female heir after he murdered rhaenyra and didn’t. both of his sons were dead, his enemy was dead, the only other living male targaryen that he knew of was his captive. it’s *almost* like aegon knew he backed himself into a corner all on the basis of usurping a woman and couldn’t then name jaehaera as his heir. it probably didn’t help that he knew his days were numbered too once word reached the remaining green council of cregan’s army. he *quite literally* fucked himself. repeatedly. an embarrassing number of times, really. dude kept his massive loser persona in tact right up until the very end. props to him for that i guess.

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I'm not saying Rhaenyra is perfect - she's far from it. But she's judged harshly for things men get a free pass. And for that, I'll always defend her.

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ASOIAF discourse about gender performance gets so insane because wdym Daenerys is a masculine character... Like she's the third most feminine POV character after Sansa and Catelyn. She's heavily associated with motherhood, marriages and romance. And I don't mean this in a negative way, Dany and Sansa are my favorite characters even though show Sansa was kinda ruined from s5 onwards.

Like yes Dany is going against misogynistic traditions by being a queen and a Khaleesi in her own right rather than as a consort. But breaking gender roles in a sexist society that doesn't let women into the same positions of power as men doesn't neccessarily make someone masculine, male-coded or whatever. She's not a tomboy, butch or even fight hand to hand like Arya/Brienne/Asha. Whether that's a good thing or bad thing for you is another thing but it's the truth.

This is pretty much the same for Rhaenyra too, except show Rhaenyra is actually slightly tomboyish in personality and was against the idea of dealing with motherhood and marriage before the time jump.

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Anyone harassing the black & brown cast of HOTD needs to fucking cope and seethe.

Bethany is Baela the Brave and she’s splendid. I can’t wait for her to get the chance to play Baela after all the racist harassment she has had to experience from not only the fandom but the shitty writing.

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rhaenyra targaryen and jacaerys velaryon, 114 AC

my mind tells me to do full artworks, but my body is telling me to doodle