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[kataraavatara]

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.

[kataraavatara]

“I think I fell in love with you,” Rhys murmured, stroking a finger down my arm, “the moment I realized you were cleaving those bones to make a trap for the Middengard Wyrm. Or maybe the moment you flipped me off for mocking you. It reminded me so much of Cassian."

And Cassian had been jealous—of Mor’s shy glances at Azriel in those first few weeks, and the fact that his dearest friend and brother . . . was looking at someone else. That she’d appeared, and then Azriel had changed. Only slightly, but Cassian had known his friend did not belong solely to him and Rhys anymore.

Azriel’s eyes slid to Eris, the High Lord’s son panting beneath him. And the shadowsinger leaned down to whisper something in his ear that made Eris blanch further.

[kataraavatara]

Something something the Black's were the side that saw dragons for what they were- loved and respected them, and saw and treated them as more than just tools of war. Caraxes and Daemon are one heart in two bodies. Syrax and Rhaenyra shared a cradle- we see Syrax reacting to Rhaenyra's pain and emotions multiple times, and Rhaenyra knew better than to treat Syrax as a war horse and nothing more- every scene they have together shows the love between them. Arrax died trying desperately to defend himself and his rider- we see him running to Luke, possibly for comfort, right before the leave Storms End, and Luke speaks to him so softly.

The greens only saw dragons as tools for power, and Aemond using Vhagar to terrorize Arrax and then losing control of her just proves it. Helaena being confirmed to almost never fly Dreamfyre confirms it. Aegon boasting about how he will hated a new, better Sunfyre than the last proves it.

And yes, Rhaenyra did return to Dragonstone hoping to hatch more dragons.. but at no point does she say she wanted a 'better' syrax.

[kataraavatara]

more reasons nessian should never have children we all know cassian chooses rhysand over nesta all day every day imagine the COMPLEX it would give you growing up to know your father is more loyal to your “uncle” than you and your mother. that is diabolical. that’s viserys targaryen levels of fatherhood fuckups.

[kataraavatara]

“Feyre reached out so much she invited nesta to live with her after the war 🥺🥺🥺” in the house with feyre’s mate who’s made his hatred of nesta no secret and constantly harasses her? the house filled with paintings of everyone but nesta? imagine seeing that visual reminder of how little your sister cares for you every. day. DAMN. as an act of reaching out/reconciliation it sucks because it wasn’t one. we need to recognize and respect that as the absolutely sick psychological warfare it was. feyre archeron i tip my hat to you because that was insane.

[kataraavatara]

the good luck babe bridge actually perfectly fits nesta cassian and the version of clare beddor i made up in my head

[kataraavatara]

what the haters simply don’t understand is that nesta archeron is the closest sarah j maas will ever get to writing a jaime lannister or theon greyjoy. like, nesta going to the wall for feyre? that was something. something real. that made me feel something, more than a thousand self pity monologues from rhysand ever could.

[kataraavatara]

Honest thoughts on Alicent Hightower?

I have a lot of empathy for women like Alicent Hightower. I know and love quite a few women like her, with similar experiences, and fears, and who make similar decisions. 

Some women who align with the system that is oppressing them do so due to their inability to envision the possibility of freedom. Therefore, they opt to join the oppressive system in the hope of gaining some power from it. They sacrifice their dreams to the patriarchy and more often than not, they're fine with this exchange because they can wield power as wives, as mothers and less commonly as daughters.

Which is understandable, sad but understandable.

It is a miserable existence, and they feel resentment when they see other women who do not want to conform to the narrow lane that patriarchy (especially African patriarchy) designates for us. They become bitter and resentful, but they never direct that bitterness towards the men who are oppressing them. They direct their bitterness towards the women in their lives, bucking patriarchal oppression as best they can, instead of the men who are actively oppressing them. 

It makes them very dangerous. Women whose entire identity is tied to the men in their lives will gladly set you on fire to keep a man, any man, warm. They'll rarely encourage men to hurt you explicitly, but they'll cheer when they do. They'll tell you that being hurt by the patriarchy is the price that you have paid for stepping out of line. For daring to aspire to more than three predetermined roles that women are destined for.

My whole life has been balancing my love and my anger at the patriarchy princesses in my life. How do you love someone who is in community with people who want you dead? In my experience, painfully and from a distance. 

[kataraavatara]

As a fan of korrasami are you also kinda mad that the writers were too cowardly to actually have korrasami in the show before it ended. Like in the last scene they just look at each other and the creators had to confirm it on twitter which isn't good enough. I mean before legend of korra we had 6teens( a show) that gave us a good female gay relationship that wasn't last episode and was explicit. Like we as a fandom should have better standards.

the network censored it, there wasn’t much they could do. the show came out in 2014, a time before gay marriage was even legalized across the us. it had nothing to do with the writers and everything to do with the network. they tried to put more explicitly romantic moments in and got kneecapped by executives

[kataraavatara]

So I'm watching this recap series on acotr and I have to ask wtf happened to tamlin after the first book

he pulls a complete personality 180 because of his trauma and becomes a controlling & abusive partner so Feyre can leave him and get with Rhysand and give sjm a reason to think she’s making some sort of deep commentary on abusive relationships and feminism. which she is not.

[kataraavatara]

could you imagine being a little girl growing up in hewn city and Mor’s in charge and you hear about her engagement and her escape and you think finally someone understands what’s happening to me and there’s proof that you can get out that things can get better and not only that but she’s in charge!! the high lord’s third in command and she’s the queen of hewn city, he said so. surely she will do something. surely she understands how you feel. and then being sent off to your forced marriage and all she does is show up every time and intimidate people as nothing more than the high lord’s lackey and then everything stays the same for a hundred years. then two hundred. then three…

[kataraavatara]

@nestaarcheronweek | Day Seven: Free Day

It happened once in a dream.

And for the last day I asked my dear friend Libia to do this illustration of Nesta and Bryce (and I’m happy that she got on board with the idea), because, I don’t know about you, but I thought this must have happened at least once in House of Flame and Shadow 😌

Art by: @lib-arts

Commissioned by: @podemechamardek

🚫 Please do not repost.

[kataraavatara]

truth hurts

team green reddit try not to resort to body shaming challenge (level impossible)

[kataraavatara]

Do yall remember ACOTAR when Rhysand grabbed Feyre's exposed BONE of her broken arm and twisted it? Cause that scene kept popping up in my head reading... the whole rest of the series. Nobody was around, nobody to see. He didn't have to do all that lmao

[kataraavatara]

most team greens (including you two based on previous interactions you’ve had with my posts) hate rhaenyra, so i’m not sure what point you’re trying to make here. Alicent is certainly the deuteragonist, I never denied that, I’m simply taking these people’s rhetoric to its logical conclusion by calling the black “protagonists” when they make posts about how the show is soooo anti team green and wants you to root for the blacks. It’s not what I think, but obviously what they think when they flood the general tags with posts about how generic and boring tb is and how they like the greens because they are different. also, I don’t even like Daemon, so miss me with that “favorite sexual predator” bullshit.

“the show obviously WANTS you to root for team black i like the greens because they’re messy and dysfunctional and doomed by the narrative” oh my gooood you don’t like the protagonists of the show? should we throw a party. should we invite bella hadid.

[kataraavatara]

velaris and ba sing se are actually really similar when you think about i- *i am dragged off stage*

[kataraavatara]

“omg nessian children 🥰” could you imagine growing up and hearing your family speak about your mother the way the IC speaks about and to nesta. and watching your father never once defend her. “cassian would be a girldad!!!” no actually this quote would encapsulate his relationship with his daughter (ib this post)