#I also think that says a lot about what her relationship with Catelyn was like but I won't get into that

[fromtheseventhhell]

Lady Smallwood's impact on Arya is really so incredible considering they spent such a short amount of time together. Arya thinks of her often and fondly, even thinking of trying to make it back to her and noting that she would've relented to being in a dress and doing needlework if she had been the one to ask. I just really, really need them to have some sort of reunion 🥺

[amber-laughs]

I frequently think about the fact that the must fuck up Jon cate interaction possible never happened cus my boy wasn't present for the 5 kings war

Picture this robb going to complain to Jon from his mum wanting to exchange Jaime for his sister and jon is just like she right of course she right

Cat going to start her no trusting theon and balon is dumb as fuck discourse just for Jon to say it word for word before she can ever speak

Like they would both be mortified but they have the same opinion a 100% of the time on every thing

I need your opinion on this

I'm so glad you asked about this because it's one of my favorite what ifs. So I will start off by saying a lot of the wisdom Jon has opposed to Robb he gains from being at or beyond the Wall so for a lot he and Robb do start off at the same baseline but like you said anon he and Catelyn have very similar priorities and suspicions from the jump that Robb either never had or was forced to give up.

We know Jon never trusted Theon and has had no reservations telling Robb in the past "Jon always said you were an ass, Greyjoy," Robb said loudly. So yes he would 100% be on Catelyn's side and I think we have enough background Robb/Jon info to say that even with Robb's coronation they would maintain the type of relationship where Jon could speak his mind in private like Catelyn does.

And we know from when Jon frees both Mance and Val he's willing to let prisoners go if he thinks he'll benefit from it. Not only that but just like Cat wants peace with the Lannisters Jon wants peace with the wildlings. I know Jon has the line "It's death and destruction I want to bring down upon House Lannister, not scorn." but at that point they've killed Robb and Ned plus thinks they killed Arya, trapped Sansa in a marriage and thinks Bran and Rickon are dead as well. If faced with the option to trade them for Jaime when Catelyn brings it up in Clash I think Jon is on her side. Even when Stannis is offering him lordship as Lord of Winterfell he declines it because he doesn't want to burn weirwoods not because he'd be a vassal to King Stannis. He doesn't seem to care about Northern Independence, in fact he's never mentioned it at all unless I'm forgetting something.

This is all if Jon never goes to the Wall at all. If somehow-someway Robb and Cat survive the Red Wedding and Jon shows up as Robb's heir after all he's learned I think Catelyn gets one fuck of an ally unfortunately I don't think she could handle having Jon there and he never brings it up again but in AGoT before Ned dies Jon says he would blame her as much as Cersei so that might come back if they're face to face, like you said I don't know if they could stand it but they would probably agree on most things.

also if you're reading this and want more Jon-Catelyn similarities feel free to click here

[jackoshadows]

I end up writing a lot about Jon Snow and Arya Stark because their relationship is indeed special in the world of Asoiaf.

However, in terms of siblings bonds, love and friendship, Jon is also incredibly close to Robb. As Jon puts it, his best friend and rival and constant companion. And even just reading Jon's memories of Robb and their interactions before he leaves for the Wall is just some of the emotionally heavy moments in Jon's POV chapters. He thinks of Robb more than even Arya. When he says farewell to his best friend Samwell in book 5, it's Robb that he remembers. If we look at mentions of the Stark siblings in Jon's POV chapters:

I know GRRM has mentioned he regrets not giving Robb a POV and I have to agree because I would have loved to burrow into his thoughts on everything.

It's clear from the text, IMO, that Robb understands and empathizes with Jon being a bastard where Arya (and Bran) are too young for the same. When Robb is a little kid he doesn't get it - the same way Arya and Bran don't get it when we meet them at the start of AGoT. We have Jon's own memories of him and Robb playing and Robb declaring that Jon can never be Lord of Winterfell because he's a bastard.

An older Robb, however, keenly empathizes with Jon. I imagine it can't have been easy to accept that he was destined to be a Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North while the half brother who grew up side by side with him had no proper future planned out for him. It would not have been easy for him to see Jon seated separately or not allowed in the training ground with a prince. He would have sensed Jon feeling ostracized and bitter and understood the cause for it.

Robb would have understood that Jon had nowhere else to go when Jon chose the Wall. That with Ned and the other adults not offering other options for Jon, the Wall was a chance for Jon to be a ranger like their uncle Benjen.

It can even be argued that Robb marrying Jeyne after she 'comforted' him was so as to not do what his father did. We see Jon wrestle with the same dilemma with Ygritte, determined not to be like his father and avowing sex so as not to have a bastard.

He seemed to have trouble saying his brothers' names. "That night, she . . . she comforted me, Mother." Catelyn did not need to be told what sort of comfort Jeyne Westerling had offered her son. "And you wed her the next day." He looked her in the eyes, proud and miserable all at once. "It was the only honorable thing to do. She's gentle and sweet, Mother, she will make me a good wife." - Catelyn, ACoK

The little bit where Robb and Jon say farewell is so loaded with both of them leaving things unsaid but understanding what was left unsaid at the same time.

In fact all of Jon's farewells - with Bran, Robb and Arya in that order - establishes the kind of relationships he has with the 3 of them in increasing order of importance. Robb and Jon's conversation in particular, demonstrates their maturity, understanding and love, and touches on a shared sense of empathy between them.

"You Starks are hard to kill," Jon agreed. His voice was flat and tired. The visit had taken all the strength from him. Robb knew something was wrong. "My mother …" "She was … very kind," Jon told him. - Jon, AGoT

Without Jon saying anything, Robb senses an emotionally heavy interaction with Catelyn. This speaks to Robb knowing how Catelyn has previously treated Jon and Jon's own response to that.

In the same vein, Jon, not wanting to hurt Robb while saying goodbye, assures Robb that Catelyn was 'kind'. That's Jon acknowledging Robb's love for his mother even as he himself hates her.

Robb looked relieved. "Good." He smiled. "The next time I see you, you'll be all in black." Jon forced himself to smile back. "It was always my color. How long do you think it will be?" "Soon enough," Robb promised. He pulled Jon to him and embraced him fiercely. "Farewell, Snow." Jon hugged him back. "And you, Stark. Take care of Bran." - Jon, AGoT

They just love each other so much.

It also speaks so much to their bond that Jon was ready to risk desertion to help Robb in his war and begs for Robb's forgiveness when he then ultimately decides to stay at the Wall and Robb declaring - despite opposition from his mother and Theon's betrayal - that Jon will be his heir, Lord of Winterfell and King in the North, looking past prejudice and bigotry

And that's the beauty of their bond, where Jon when considering Stannis' offer of Winterfell, recalls Robb's hurtful words and is so emotionally distraught that he blacks out in fury.

“You can’t be Lord of Winterfell, you’re bastard-born. My lady mother says you can’t ever be the Lord of Winterfell.” - Robb

When all the while this was what Robb was saying about the brother he loved.

“Should I die without issue, I want him to succeed me as King in the North.” - Robb

This is why Robb Stark's last decree is important. For closure for the Jon/Robb relationship and Jon's own conflicted feelings about accepting Stannis' offer of Winterfell. To know how much Robb loved him and accepted him as a brother. That it was not all one sided - that just as Jon wanted to desert to help his brother, Robb was declaring Jon his heir and Lord of Winterfell. The decree speaks to that bond of brotherhood, trust, loyalty and love.

Jon refuses Stannis's offer because of preconditions like burning the Winterfell Godswood - the Old Gods of the North - and his guilt of taking what was Robb's. With Robb's decree there are no such preconditions and it affirms Robb's trust in him to do what's right.

And I hope some day GRRM finishes TWoW and we get to read Jon Snow's reaction to getting that final decree and knowing that Robb did indeed think Jon would be Lord of Winterfell.

[laurellerual]

in agot arya mentions becoming a high Septon in *that* line, its been a while since I read the books so I don't remember a lot but do you think arya will end up having a big role in any faith (the seven or the old gods)? i can't remember if she thought about religion a lot or not

High septon Arya with some cool high priestess tarot symbolism

Good question. Arya is the only main character to be part of a religious order, and is not clearly falling into the 'chosen one' category. I expect that all the religions and respective magics that she has encountered will play a fundamental role in her future.

I don't see Arya in a role like the High Septon because I don't think she recognizes the Seven as her own gods. I would say that Arya believes in the Old Gods and the Many-Faced God, and that she recognizes the power of R'hllor.

I think that in the future Arya could find herself in the position of 'collaborator/lay member' of the FM order, perhaps fulfilling a similar role as Brusco and Izembaro, but it is only speculation.

Some random thoughts on religion in Arya's storyline not a meta:

Religions are a fairly recurring topic in her chapters, she is probably the character who has encountered most faiths, but her relationship with them is particular. She seems to be quite curious about religion, especially now that she's in Braavos and surrounded by the strangest temples.

One time, the girl remembered, the Sailor's Wife had walked her rounds with her and told her tales of the city's stranger gods. "That is the house of the Great Shepherd. Three-headed Trios has that tower with three turrets. The first head devours the dying, and the reborn emerge from the third. I don't know what the middle head's supposed to do. Those are the Stones of the Silent God, and there the entrance to the Patternmaker's Maze. Only those who learn to walk it properly will ever find their way to wisdom, the priests of the Pattern say. Beyond it, by the canal, that's the temple of Aquan the Red Bull. Every thirteenth day, his priests slit the throat of a pure white calf, and offer bowls of blood to beggars."

We know that she was raised in a mixed faith family. But while there is a septa to take care of her education I don't think the Stark children were born in the light of the Seven.

Arya never seems to refer to the religion of the Seven as her own. She defines the seven as "the southron god, the one with seven faces". She also never pray to them and she doesn't uses many common language expressions concerning them. But she often notices symbols or expressions related to the Seven that are used by the people around her. For example, in contrast, it's funny how often the Hound says "seven hells" or how often she hears "Mother have mercy".

But this religion can be useful to better understand the character from a thematic point of view, especially in her relationship with her mother. For example, it is interesting to see how Cat, for a moment, sees Arya in the warrior. Or how Arya could end up filling the role of Mercy for Merciless Mother.

This passage where Cat describes the Old gods as faceless particularly interesting in light of Arya's future, but also in light of Cat's future. In fact Lady Stoneheart's face ironically resembles the face of a weirwood.

Catelyn had been anointed with the seven oils and named in the rainbow of light that filled the sept of Riverrun. She was of the Faith, like her father and grandfather and his father of her before him. Her gods had names, and their faces were as familiar as the faces of her parents. Worship was a septon with a censer, the smell of incense, a seven-sided crystal alive with light, voices raised in song. The Tullys kept a godswood, as all the great houses did, but it was only a place to walk or read or lie in the sun. Worship was for the sept. For her sake, Ned had built a small sept where she might sing to the seven faces of god, but the blood of the First Men still flowed in the veins of the Starks, and his own gods were the old ones, the nameless, faceless gods of the greenwood they shared with the vanished children of the forest.

The Old gods have a much more obvious importance for Arya. This is the religion she prays to and the one she is immersed from narrative. Arya sees and crosses some of the most important places of this faith: High heart and the God's eye. The scene in the godswood of Harrenhal is fundamentally related to the theme of identity. I talked more about this here.

But the Old gods haven't an organized faith so I don't think it works to think of it as analogous to the faith of the Seven. I mean that there are no 'roles' to fill here. Bran's storyline could tell us more about this.

When Arya arrives in Braavos she sees a Sept, but she never goes there. Her thoughts go to the fact that this is a city without trees instead.

I think we need to keep an eye on the Many-Faced God and the Old gods because they're the deities that have the most thematic relevance in Arya's story right now. Somehow they represent the crossroads at which she is.

They are not my Seven. They were my mother's gods, and they let the Freys murder her at the Twins. She wondered whether she would find a godswood in Braavos, with a weirwood at its heart. Denyo might know, but she couldn't ask him. Salty was from Saltpans, and what would a girl from Saltpans know about the old gods of the north? The old gods are dead, she told herself, with Mother and Father and Robb and Bran and Rickon, all dead. A long time ago, she remembered her father saying that when the cold winds blow the lone wolf dies and the pack survives. He had it all backwards. Arya, the lone wolf, still lived, but the wolves of the pack had been taken and slain and skinned.

Perhaps when winter comes we will discover that this crossroads is not as marked as it might seem. I'm not the first person here to discuss how similar in their description Bloodraven's Cave and House of Black and White are. In particular there is a visual and thematic parallel in the use of weirwood, in the appearance of Bloodraven and the kindly man and in the type of meat that is served to Arya and Bran.

We must also take into consideration the religion of R'hllor which will become increasingly important in twow. Arya has encountered this before and is familiar with its power to resurrect the dead this way. This will certainly affect her opinion of Lady Stoneheart and Jon Snow. Also we've seen Melisandre's glamors and we know these are listed by the kindly man as one of the methods Arya will need to learn. Even the concept of blood magic seems somewhat akin to the methods of the FMs.

Another religion to keep an eye on for the future is that of the Moonsingers because, as was discussed around here a few days ago, we could see Arya frequent their temple. They are as old as the FM, among the founders of Braavos and seem to deal respectively with life and death.

"The Isle of the Gods is farther on. See? Six bridges down, on the right bank. That is the Temple of the Moonsingers." It was one of those that Arya had spied from the lagoon, a mighty mass of snow-white marble topped by a huge silvered dome whose milk glass windows showed all the phases of the moon. A pair of marble maidens flanked its gates, tall as the Sealords, supporting a crescent-shaped lintel.

This could become relevant in the next book when Arya gets her moonblood.

"It may be that the Many-Faced God has led you here to be His instrument, but when I look at you I see a child . . . and worse, a girl child. Many have served Him of Many Faces through the centuries, but only a few of His servants have been women. Women bring life into the world. We bring the gift of death. No one can do both."

Furthermore, the fact that Moonsinger and Wolf are practically synonymous is certainly... a choice.

"Snow," the moon murmured. The wolf made no answer. Snow crunched beneath his paws. The wind sighed through the trees. Far off, he could hear his packmates calling to him, like to like. They were hunting too. A wild rain lashed down upon his black brother as he tore at the flesh of an enormous goat, washing the blood from his side where the goat's long horn had raked him. In another place, his little sister lifted her head to sing to the moon, and a hundred small gray cousins broke off their hunt to sing with her. The hills were warmer where they were, and full of food. Many a night his sister's pack of him gorged on the flesh of sheep and cows and horses, the prey of men, and sometimes even on the flesh of man himself.

[silverystrings]

whether for good or ill

i think that there is so much tension and hatred towards house of the dragon and has been since the beginning, that hating on the writers and everyone involved has become too much. i just don’t think that sara and ryan are d&d. d&d and everyone involved in game of thrones were arrogants and misogynists and thought that they were better. i mean by the end they didn’t give a fuck that much.

but with ryan and sara, i think they aren’t those arrogants and misogynists despite the contrary beliefs. i think they geniunely enjoy the world and they tried a different approach. they are the not like the other girls. jk jk unless..

no but this particular history was difficult to do either way. we are talking about the targaryens; the incest made them mad blood purist “perception” of the audience//general/local audience. and they do start with “they are their own enemy/downfall”. so i don’t think they have forgotten that. they have “themes”. and yes they have tried to do a character arc for everyone in big and small ways. and yes hbo crossing two other episodes probably damaged this second season a lot. i mean season 1 was also like this until the last two episodes where shit it’s at its peak. and the second season probably could have ended up too in that way.

as some reactor said, it felt like in this finale everyone kind of found themselves, even more setting up to do for season three.

daemon in the finale of season 1 wasn’t really loyal to rhaenyra in the complete sense. the way he was looking at her at visenya’s funeral, the clashing in the council, the choking, the way he said “dreams didn’t make us kings, dragons did” ????????? and the scene in the second season with rhaenyra, the way she says my throne, and he throws it in her face what he thought all along, that viserys chose her because of daemon.. and then he goes to harrenhal alone, tries to be a king, gets haunted by all these “dreams” and finally understands and supports Rhaenyra fully, that she is the rightful queen, and the part they play in the greater story. we know that season 3 and potentially 4 are just deaths after deaths. and as a lot have predicted, they probably will be estranged again. but it won’t be for the throne, for the heir, for this thing that has been between them since the beginning of the show. it will be because of his daughters. (laena;have you looked after our girls)

alicent—i don’t think the writers did nothing with her. i mean they love liv and what she brings to the table and alicent. they never wouldn’t have a plan for her character. she is a character that is the only one who survives and dies the last. as i said i don’t define her character as her being a mother. in fact that’s why ryan and sara are better at bringing something different. constantly in game of thrones we have all the women or the contraversial ones like cersei or catelyn but especially cersei: have being a mother define her character. “your love for your children is the only redeeming quality. if it wasn’t for my kids i would have thrown myself off the red keep a long time ago.” there are so many scenes and quotes about cersei and her loving her children and doing everything for her children. and yes that’s great. but in the books, she wants to rule for herself because her time has come, and she doesn’t want tommen to rule or learn or anything. yes she cares deeply and is constantly concerned for their well being. but still in the show it was very exaggerated. because they loved cersei but the audience didn’t. so her one quality was her motherhood. and that’s great. but as i said sara and ryan don’t make motherhood their only quality. alicent is a child bride and she has a veeeery complicated relationship with her kids. and her crowning aegon is definitely moreso because her and otto truly believed in keeping the peace of the realm. having a female heir, war was gonna follow. so that’s why alicent did it. yes the viserys part it’s oopsies but i mean dreams and tragedy are a targaryen thing and not far fetched. so she did that. and she completely lost. and by the end she sees that this isn’t “right” and wanting war to end. she is at last herself. she did what she was supposed to do, the mission of her life, and now she is free. i am so curious to how her arc is gonna go from now. is she gonna go and meet up with daeron? maybe she will try to put him on the throne when the people turn against rhaenyra and she thinks he is the best of them?!?! i know people think her story was over in s1. i think those are very misogynistic fans. alicent isn’t a villain and it’s not gonna be one. the writers have said this since the beginning. and i for one love that. she is the most normal character in the whole show. i said what i said. otto for making her be a child bride was the worst. the targaryens and rhaenyra and daemon were always gonna be a problem for her. and she making male heirs was always gonna be a problem for them. she is free. is she gonna be like arya? idk.

rhaenyra— ooof. i think this season was her finally getting assurance that she is the “chosen” one for the prophecy and that she is the heir, not because viserys spurns daemon. and i think as daemon finally understands the dreams importance, rhaenyra also understands the dragons’s importance. i mean they completely turn the tide for her in this season. and i know how much criticized rhaenyra’s and alicent’s relationship is. but alicent coming to her at last and essentially confirming and wanting her to take the throne it’s like the last thing to come full circle. her father truly believed on her and not because of daemon, daemon finally accepts that she is the heir too and is firmly done with the “pursuit” of it. and alicent, her best friend, the mother of viserys’s other kids, her enemy, her best friend, finally “supports her”. it was a rollercoaster it’s true. but she came on top. and i think now she will not be stoping herself in blooding her hands or doing necessary things for keeping herself on that throne. i think others have done thinkpieces on how she was like sacrificing the people to claim the dragons. all those scenes. and how she will truly believe that she is that one for the prophecy and will do anything now. i think dragons dying is gonna be her weakness just as how she started to feeling powerful with the dragons. i have seen theories of fisherman lucerys. and this is exactly the type of thing that sara and ryan could do. we won’t even know what started the war in the first place. luke dying is sad, but not defining. i know it sounds crazy. but even if he died or not, the war was always gonna get ugly.

i think these are the big characters of the show. and others are all also in personal journeys. rhaena finally having a dragon and being “useful”, criston accepting his faults (i mean alicent’s brother questioned him in front of everyone, pissing in his honour as a knight, the thing he was obsessed with, almost killed himself over, killed joffrey over, is now accepting his faults and accepting his death, he fought in wars before but wanted something more for his name, and he lost all of it to the dragons. he is defeated in every sense. his only arc is fighting as he was before the kingsguard. we have helaena who again isn’t defined only by a tragedy as sick as b&cheese. she still touches jahaera after. she is a dragon dreamer. and i don’t want her to just kill herself because of sadness. i know that we criticize the show for the grief and how quickly it’s over. i do agree too. but again i m not gonna define them by it. helaena speaking to daemon and aemond knowing how their fates are intertwined or rather their deaths. why did they do this? i guess helaena never being heard for her dreams and she now herself reaches out at the end to speak her “wisdom” and is actually listened and believed by both of them. it’s some sort of progress. but doesn’t she see herself is the question? possibly the same day too?!? hmm. aegon and aemond. i think everyone has said a lot abt them. tragedy is always gonna be present in this show. shakespearean tragedy. and also everyone is grey. we see the tragedy of both of them bc they never were suited for the throne. and that power.. absolute power as otto says.. especially in this family period and in this war.. it was gonna be poisonous..

idk i get all the complaints.. but as i said i could never treat them as d&d. especially for the female characters. they are actual characters. and yes i was mad too, at the “women peace and men bad bc war”.. but that is present in the book too. it’s the women who bind the wounds. and i did want to see mother playing this game for her son, rhaenyra wanting the throne for herself and being vengeful. and i think we will see that. but in different ways. not in obvious ways, in caricature like ways. and men did want war and were thirsting for war. so much peace that the last “war” was with maegor. so everyone jumped at the chance to write songs for them without knowing the cost of war especially with dragons. this isn’t a theme only in hotd but in asoiaf too.

i think they and the adaptation has flaws.. but i can’t call all of it shit or soulless. it was always gonna be a hard story to do. especially in the pov of the targaryens. they are their own downfall and so are the dragons. that’s how it’s gonna end hotd and same with every adaptation.

i m almost excited for a knight of the seven kingdoms, but man not for aegon the conqueror one. i genuinely think we don’t need it. and everything post dance is so much more interesting so i won’t be mad at those adaptations. but again grrm is never finishing those books. and so sometimes the question does arise of what’s even the point of these adaptations. i guess we just can enjoy them but even that is a crime. however picking the story where all the dragons die isn’t a bad idea for a show. especially with the events of asoiaf and game of thrones. it’s just that the “heroes” are not obviously targaryens and so it’s kind of hard and depressive to enjoy them. idk idk idk and just thinking abt the years its gonna take to make these other seasons it’s insane. insane for the fandoms and not normal people obviously 😭

[atopvisenyashill]

I think the point that a lot of people miss with Arya is that the approval she craves the most is of her mother. People call her pretty, including her father and Jon. But she still doesn't think she is pretty because she doesn't measure up to her mother's expectations. We know it hurts her that unlike her siblings, she doesn't look like Catelyn. Which is funny to me because Catelyn despaired that none of her children looked like Ned, except Arya. So no Catelyn did not hate that Arya didn't have Tully looks (believe me I have seen that take numerous times), rather she wanted her to take care of herself and be presentable.

Yeah like, I would say it’s even a pretty common dynamic in real life, where you have a daughter that doesn’t quite fit in and a mother who does and they talk past each other a lot of the times. It’s not to say that I don’t wish Catelyn had taken a more gentle approach to Arya, or that it’s like, an okay thing that the system they live in forces the toxicity of this situation but I think people really gloss over the fundamental aspect of this (and like,,, most) mother-daughter relationships which is that Arya wants her mother to be proud of her and Catelyn wants Arya to be prepared for adulthood. Neither of them is acting out of a bad place here and neither is motivated by anything hostile. Catelyn just feels, pragmatically, that there are certain things Arya needs to know and understand about the world and the life she’ll be expected to live. While Arya wishes her mother could conceive of a world where Arya can just be whomever she wants without being forced into a specific mold or role.

I kinda scrapped this part of that Cat & Arya meta I wrote, but I had like a whole section wherein like, Catelyn knows that The Rules Of Men allowed her a lot of power - she was presumptive heir, acting lady, and now a lady of a great seat with a husband who adores her in part because of her willfulness and fiery temper. What Catelyn wants for Arya is for Arya to have the tools she needs to succeed as a willful, fiery girl in a World Of Men, so that Arya can find a man who loves her for who she is and find freedom in her home & marriage. But because while Arya and Catelyn may share temperaments, they don’t have a lot of overlap in skills, I think Arya sees more clearly and much sooner than it’s simply ridiculous and unfair that Arya has to have this really specific skill set to be worth anything, and that what she’s “worth” to a man shouldn’t be as important as what she’s worth to herself. But like, how do you even verbalize a concept you’re only slightly aware if you’re Arya? How do you tell your mother that the skills she’s honed for her whole life in the hopes that her life as a woman in a feudal system is happy, are like, ~useless~ and have no moral value, it’s just something Cat is good at vs something Arya is good at?? I mean the whole reason i CUT that section was because i felt like i wasn’t hitting the balance of explaining and validating both WHAT IT IS Catelyn wants for Arya out of the system and also WHY IT IS that Arya chafes so badly.

Ultimately, Arya wants to want what her mother wants for her because that’s her mom, she wants to be like her mom, she wants her mom to be proud of her, and also ultimately, Catelyn wants Arya to be safe, and alive, and thinks to herself that Arya would be good at running a household, and since running a household gave Catelyn power, it’s a sweet wish that Catelyn wants to set Arya up to be someone who is great with the only power Catelyn feels she can give her. But they see the world so differently, because they are both stubborn and willful while being Incredibly different & living very different childhoods, and before Catelyn can hold Arya and assure her that she would have wanted her back no matter what, even if her hair is messy and she’s dressing like a boy, even if she never fits in and has killed people, because Catelyn loves her enough to fight against that system that has benefit Cat all those years……but it’s too late, and Catelyn is gone before she can ever say the words I know she wanted to say, the words that Arya needed to hear.

[swordsandarms]

This is a reply in regards to this post, which highlights the high likelihood that, whether people are fine with the author's choices or not, RxL is written by him with romantic nuance as far as the text goes. @sahtinekryze

And I think this fandom really needs to have a honest analysis of the idea of "selfishness" in narrative choices such as this, which is that when it comes to how the whole "duty vs love" scenarios Martin writes, he does not actually writes it with some wide spectrum ranging from selfish to sacrificial. There are usually no other choices than the two.

Could one define the alleged choice of breaking a noble marriage contract that would have negative political influence at the least, had it been the best case scenario (which one would logically assume the two might have hoped for instead of very lots of people dying including themselves) as 'selfish', which in its very definition is doing something for one's self, though it may not be advantageous for others? Yes.

But as I said, Martin doesn't write a middle ground. There's that, or Lyanna marries an unwanted man and is hence forced to have a non-consensual relationship with him, and forced to carry children out of a noncon relationship, so that her male relatives can reap benefits of political power, as well as her groom through her womb. And as shows inspired by these books love to show us very graphic such cases (like Daenerys in GOT, or the storyline given to show!Sansa, or the changes for show!Alicent in HOTD), I am sure fans should have learnt better about the accusations usually thrown at Lyanna in fandom spaces in regards to being another woman marrying against her will in a society where a woman cannot say no, marital rape isn't recognised, and a husband is "just taking his rights": that "this is just being whiny". (There are many other examples in the books; the author is also not holding back on what unwanted or unsuitable marriages mean to women.)

Against the fanon idea that she is some wild, demanding, conceited girl, she doesn't rage, she doesn't bite. She has a tentative, soft spoken conversation with her brother about it and her reluctance in the matter, and is (nicely) dismissed.

Had she not (allegedly, while all is unconfirmed) fallen for the Crown Prince and he for her, there is no one else powerful enough to extract her from her situation (her male relatives having made up their own minds in the matter), nor anyone else to go from where she cannot be recovered by a powerful and connected family and fiance. No one else she could marry/sleep with that wouldn't be shut down and covered (as seen with Tyrion or Lysa) to preserve the higher price for which her womb can be bartered. Just no other viable choice that wasn't the other end of the scale: a woman being sacrificed by men, for men's uses.

As I said at the start, this is simply how Martin writes these conflicts of "mind and heart". He corners the characters. There is no light at the end of the tunnel that isn't also sort of "selfish" and "dumb" looking on the surface.

This can be applied to more such situations in the text-

Catelyn undoes the already precarious state of her son's campaign by releasing their most valuable captive. She has not even a guarantee that her 'selfish' act for love will work. But there are no options she's given. No one else cares to make it a priority to get her daughters back. The only other choice is to let it be and let 2 girls be sacrificed in marriages of ill intent to use their wombs and discard them, unsure if she will find anything left of them but Lannister named babies when this is over. It is "selfish". It is "dumb". Yet she's cornered.

Jon makes the decision to go fight Ramsay Bolton because he's run out of options and he's cornered. Arya is allegedly in the hands of the family that have viciously killed a number of Starks and taken Winterfell. She is 11 and allegedly married. He is made sick at the thought of what is being done to her. He's tried the "lesser" tactics of getting her rescued without being seen as trespassing the status quo of the NW publicly, by sending others for her. But it was always going to come to this. Ramsay guesses (or finds out) that his escaped bride would make it to the Wall. Keeping "peace" and "doing his duty" instead of "being selfish and dumb" is handing over "Arya" himself if she even makes it to appease the Lord of Winterfell, sacrificing a girl to an unwanted marriage meant to use her for her womb and discard her.

There are no actual choices when there is no actual scale in between "selfish and dumb" and the sacrifice of a girl (or, you know, 2,3, as many as Westeros would swallow as it did for millennia for this or that Lord or King to amass and keep power), whether they are Lannisters trying to get Winterfell, or Starks extinguishing the line of the Warg King.

[melrosing]

Ok speaking of changes GOT made… is there any changes you like? I struggle to find big moments, but there are small additions I love. Like Ned praying before he dies, Robb hitting the tree when he finds out, the chemistry that Kit Harrington and Rose Leslie have…. But there are very few structural changes I think improve the story.

hmmm so I can't lie there is a LOT I just don't remember anymore about the show, so wringing my mind a little to come up with something.....

I won't mention things that I think were adapted well (like Ned's execution) as those aren't adaptational changes. and I also won't mention things that I like the idea of (e.g. Jaime's dyslexia) but not the execution (they made out it was part of the longrunning 'stupidest Lannister' joke).

and like.... well I'm stuck already lmao?? I'm not even trying to shit on the show I just feel like it was a consistent exercise in either understating GRRM's work or butchering it entirely. so I can think of only a few things:

I can't find the link to where I talked about this at length but the scene in which Jaime and Ned duel in the streets of KL was a good one imo. I think it was more in character for Jaime to just recklessly fight Ned himself, and a neat parallel to what I suspect will happen between Ned, Arthur and Howland - in that when Ned is attacked from behind by one of Jaime's men in the midst of their fight, Jaime angrily ends the duel bc his man has essentially dishonoured it. I think Ned's fight with Arthur will end as it did in the show (with Howland stabbing Arthur from behind and Ned finishing the job, bc he needs to reach Lyanna), and this is like a parallel to show Jaime and Ned have the same principles, yet each have broken them in times of desperation. My personal theory is that this was a change GRRM recommended - the parallel seems notable to me, and not one that would've even occurred to D&D, esp. given they never gave any particular shit about Jaime's story. And this may sound spurious but I recall that GRRM remembers in an interview, saying the weather was different in the show version of the scene than in the books.... which makes me think he was maybe onset for this one, possibly because of the rewrite??

I'm v much in favour of ageing up the youngest characters. My ideal starting ages for the youngest characters in AGOT would've been Jon/Robb/Dany - 18, Joffrey/Sansa - 14, Arya - 12, Bran - 10. To me they all feel much too young for the roles they play in the story, and it occasionally kills my suspension of disbelief

I way prefer the book’s version of the Red Wedding but I do feel like Catelyn's single cry of despair works better than the book's manic laughter. maybe the laughter was a more vivid image for the books idk

I do actually like how we see Robb's grief onscreen it's very movingly played by Richard Madden. I also love Catelyn's expressions as Robb rides back from the Whispering Wood, like both these scenes are great reminders of their mother/son relationship in a setting where they aren't really allowed to be just that. and like just Michelle Fairley tbh I really like her work as Catelyn even though I don't like how the character was adapted more generally

Breaking the 'concept but not execution' rule just to say I think it was definitely a good idea to explore the High Sparrow as this weirdly charismatic figure so we can see how others might be taken in by him, even whilst we see the extremes of his faith. but that subplot was not executed well at all so fuck it

Yeah I agree that Jon and Ygritte having a slightly more charged romance also works. In the books Ygritte comes and goes quite quickly and I think there is something to be said for lending a bit more gravity to that relationship. I don't think they necessarily had to be the grand romance that the show makes them out to be but I didn't hate it

I might be forgetting other things that worked because some seasons I haven't seen since like 2015, but honestly it just doesn't work for me as an adaptation. things I liked in the show before reading the books feel completely naff in hindsight, knowing how they were supposed to play out, so..... eh

[pixiecactus]

my disclaimer for this is that as i've said before i don't like gendrya modern aus, but i couldn't get this idea out of my head so...

i want to preface this with, my initial idea was: imagine arya having to balance attending a family gala (or whatever rich people do) with her first date with gendry and she ends up assisting to this prestigious event in the date outfit she choose while her mother and sister are wearing designer dresses that probably cost more than a house. also imagine catelyn trying to sabotage her daughter's relationship with this nobody-with-no-future, always planning these events exactly the days where said daughter meets with her boyfriend... but then, said boyfriend always carries a backpack with a change of clothes for his girlfriend that hates using those expensive designer clothes… and that idea evolved into this monstrosity of a post.

so the lannisters ordered a hit on ned stark after he discovered cersei's children secret, the plans for a future engagement between joffrey baratheon and sansa stark fell through after that, arya escaped from the baratheon manor and spend a long time living in the streets (somehow similar to the books) meanwhile the police investigated her father's death. i would say that arya and gendry met in a youth center (time to explain some things, okay so in the books, it is mentioned that their age difference is 5 years... but that doesn't make any sense if we follow the events before gendry's birth. so i do think that their age difference in the books is actually three years, in agot gendry 12 arya 9 and in affc gendry 14 arya 11... and well here's just a two year difference because any larger difference while one of them has their adult brain fully developed and the other doesn't makes me feel weird)

so... yes catelyn is alive in this universe, i do think that ned's death impulsed robb to follow his father's steps in a politician career a lot sooner than what was expected. i think that the idea of how the starks can't talk about the baratheons/lannisters due to have signed a nda in exchange for having the starks daughters back is funny (i do think that ndas become null and void if the information has to do with crimes actually being committed, but don't quote me in that, because i honestly don't know... like i have never signed one in my life so if that fact is real, let's just ignore it) the starks get played too in this because what they get back is sansa and jeyne poole, no arya in sight.

i do see arya and gendry getting sporadic jobs to be able to afford somewhere to sleep, gendry is able to get a job as a mechanic that pays him under the table meanwhile arya is pretty much unlucky in getting a job for a long period of time (gendry won't hear a thought of her becoming a sex worker even when they are running short on money) when they meet the brotherhood without banners, arya is distrusting of them, even more when she realizes harwin, the son of one of the stark's workers has joined this ragtag group, and his loyalty no longer lays with her family. after learning that they have valiant ned's precious little girl in their hands the bwb decide they will bring arya back to her family to be able to claim the money the starks are offering for her safe return.

arya notices how now it seems that all of gendry's free time is spent with different members of the brotherhood instead of with her, she misses the time when they were the only ones the other could rely on. when she hears how the bwb is desperate for the money her name offers, she just wants to escape, they could never understand that her family would never want her back after having to live in the streets, all dirty and without caring for her appearance, and having to steal food to eat. her mother would be deeply ashamed of her, same as her father if he was still alive. she feels betrayed by gendry, when he doesn't see anything wrong with the brotherhood without banners plans and later letting her know that he plans to stay with the brotherhood when she gets back to her family. so she escapes the abandoned house in the woods that the bwb uses as a shelter for their members, to never be seen again by them.

time to clarify here that arya and gendry met when she was 12 and he was 14 and by the time they got separated arya was 16 and gendry was 18.

no, arya does not make it to braavos (my girl does not have a passport in her hands) she lays low for a long while staying in the riverlands, doing her best to avoid any town she remembers the brotherhood having contacts on it, trying to get pay under the table once again. she is able to stay in a girls and women only shelter, and without the need to pay for a roof to sleep under, the money she gets in her sporadic jobs is shared with the community that stays in the same shelter with her. getting the trust of the woman who's in charge of the shelter: ravella smallwood.

one day arya is put in charge of the operation while ravella has to go away for a while, trying to get more funds for the shelter from private donors, when she has to receive a group of individuals looking forward to help in the shelter as volunteers: two girls and a boy... yeah you guessed it, it's reunion time. i do imagine that willow has to fiercely hold gendry in place by tugging his arm (after thinking her dead, the boy just wanted to hug her and never let go). arya gives the group the forms to apply as volunteers, while deciding to ignore gendry's strange reaction to seeing her again for completely. she imagines now that he knows she is in here, even if his background check is approved he will not want to spend his time working in this shelter with arya being around. (oh boy, she's very wrong...)

look, i'm going to attribute this to me being aromantic, but i can't ever get a romance build up right, i like seeing it develop and reading about it, but i just can't understand it. but you get it, they start working together again, arya's strictly professional, she was so hurt after gendry chose the brotherhood over her after everything they went through together, that she simply won't let him get close to her and give him the opportunity to hurt her again.

i forgot to say that now they are reunited. the ages go like this: arya is 21, gendry is 23, jeyne is 28 and willow is 20.

the heddle sisters obviously are able to see the unfinished business between them from miles away, so they take every chance they get to leave the two of them alone, so they can talk things out, sadly both sisters soon discover that arya is the only one who can compete with gendry’s stubbornness with her very own.

this brings me to… arya wants to befriend the heddle sisters so badly, jeyne is hardworking, stern but motherly in the same way that ravella is, and willow, she is so willful and caring of others that arya is reminded of herself. the only thing that bothers arya about them is they always try to put gendry across her path, and it doesn’t make sense at all. so arya doesn’t have any other option than take things into her own hands and confront the heddles about it and if she has to be vulnerable and tell them about how hurt she was when gendry abandoned her… so be it, she wants to be at peace again.

well… arya played herself; their conversation ends up with willow telling her about how gendry has always had a crush on her, but both sisters believe that his feelings for her go even deeper than that and they tell her about how when they met him not so long after arya escaped the brotherhood and he seemed to be heartbroken too.

and pretty much arya.exe stopped working after that. because gendry liking her in a romantic way seems almost like a cruel joke. this is the boy that saw her as a dirty child who always got mistaken for a boy, she's still the same girl that had him cutting almost all of her hair off in an effort to stop her from getting lice in her hair, and he's still the same boy that saw her eating dirt and worms once when she was desperate for food they didn't have. and... even if gendry was able to forget all of those moments, she still was ugly "arya horseface" and no time passing between them would erase that.

a few days after arya had that realization, gendry is the one who searches for the opportunity to talk to her. arya is definitely surprised when the first words she hears him speak to her in weeks is: "i'm sorry" and then, gendry is equally as surprised when arya answers with: “why did you lie to them?”

of course arya's brain wouldn't let her believe she could be liked that way... that was always sansa and never her.

cue *sappy love confession* coming from gendry... i can imagine ending with something along the lines of: "... because i just do... alright? i think i was gone for you even before i was able to understand what those feelings were. i never stood a chance to fight them."

i think arya is in shock after hearing this coming from his mouth, but i guess it helps that gendry has always been easy in the eyes, she remembers the sex workers she befriended when living in the streets talking about him and how handsome he was... she didn't understand back then, he was just gendry, her stupid and most loyal friend. so arya feels like she's getting hit by a train with her feelings for him...

and he he, their first kiss gets interrupted by ravella arriving at the shelter alongside... catelyn stark? who is presented as their most important private donor the shelter has seen from now on... so more reunions coming along the way.

if i remember correctly: a parent can't legally oblige their child to come back to live with them at their house when found after being missing if said child is over the majority of age (again don't quote me on that, i heard about this watching a true crime video) so at catelyn's displeasure arya decides to stay living at the shelter, but agrees to visit her family once again. arya will always love her family but she's proud of the life she has built for herself in this community.

it feels wrong to come back to the stark manor in winterfell knowing her father won't be there to smile at her dirty face and willful spirit, and it hurts so much to have the knowledge that jon won't be there waiting for her either. even when coming back home, her family is incomplete and sadly it will remain like that... but arya is grateful to see bran again moving around the place using his wheelchair, the last time she saw him he was still in a coma after his fall and even rickon, the youngest of the bunch remembers her no matter if he was just a baby when arya left for king's landings with her father and sister.

so coming back to what i wrote in the beginning of this post, catelyn starts to organize fundraiser galas for the shelter arya lives/works at, hoping that once arya is introduced back into this lifestyle, she will come back to her family and leave behind the man catelyn saw arya holding hands with.

arya and gendry decide to go in a date since they got interrupted when they tried to kiss and mostly they want to keep things professional between them when they are helping at the shelter and arya can't fathom why or how but her mother sets the date of the fundraiser gala on the same day she did agree to meet with gendry. arya thinks she will be able to make it in time to change her outfit between the date and assisting her family gala, but how does the old saying goes? "time flies when you're having fun" and arya is left with no other option than to go in the same clothes she was wearing during the day, catelyn and sansa are appalled when they see her. from what i remember, at least in my country, the socialites always have reporters and photographers at the ready in any kind of event they participate in, besides this is the first event where the lost stark daughter is going to make a public appearance.

catelyn seeing arya mingling with reporters is starting to make her regret her decision, what was she even thinking? arya has always been unpredictable and is the only member of the family that is not pr trained. arya could cost robb the next election result with any word coming from her mouth. this was a grave mistake.

what catelyn often forgets is that arya is naturally charming as well. everytime she is asked about her outfit she plainly tells the truth and then she is the one to change the theme of the conversation to what’s actually important here: ravella smallwood’s shelter for girls and women.

the internet slowly begins to love arya, because i imagine that people first reaction when learning arya’s existence pretty much is: “the starks are launching another nepo baby” add a few more fundraisers appearances to get “she’s real and pretty funny” to finally end up with “arya stark is our very own people’s princess”

arya only accepts interviews with the press if the subject matter is the shelter she lives/works at rather than herself. when asked why she dresses down when attending galas, arya answers that it wouldn’t feel right to wear an item of clothing that can cost the same as an apartment.

and suddenly we have a massive group of people across the country criticizing the richest families in all westeros and gendry has never been more proud of arya.

to end this post, i want to say: can we think about cersei lannister for a minute…? she was just living her best widowed life and then someday she sees in the press the ghosts of lyanna stark and robert baratheon… give it a few hours… and then cersei comes to the realization that the little brat who hurt joffrey is still alive and back with her family… and that’s not all… she’s in a romantic relationship with one of her dead husband’s bastards. the poor woman just girlbossed too close to the sun.

(as a bonus i added some other outfits arya used in her dates with gendry and later the fundraiser galas... i just see arya using a lot of muted colors in her wardrobe... if i had to describe her sense of style in a concept it would be "still life" like the paintings, i just want to add that this type of painting is called "naturaleza muerta" in spanish and the direct translation would be "dead nature" which in my opinion sounds a lot better. oh and have a lil gendry, who always uses the same suit, afterall is the only one he has... and sansa wants to die everytime she sees him wearing that thing because the jacket and the pants are two differents shades of black)

[thehauntingofharrenhouse]

SIGHING the age difference between margaery and sansa is p big for teenagers! margaery is closer to jon and robb's age than sansa's. margaery and her family actively pursued an interest in elevating her to queen from at least the first book if not longer, tywin was actively trying to arrange a marriage between cersei and rhaegar before the maggy scene, which takes place when cersei was younger than sansa is at the beginning of the series. ned and catelyn had barely discussed sansa's options before joffrey shows up; they might have thought of it later or they might have chosen someone else. the wealthy southern houses are ambitious, but starks rarely send their daughters south to marry. sansa has talent and big dreams, and cat would at least think to take that into account. likely cat was expecting to marry her into another great house, but we know cat wanted her kids to be happy?? and be children?? for as long as they can. she was surprised and a little upset that robb was wearing live steel, even tho he's nearly an adult by westerosi standards and competent enough to manage winterfell when she understandably neglects her duties while bran is in his coma.

this is not a bad thing!! this is reasonable!! and cat did teach sansa how to be a lady the same way ned taught robb and jon to be a lord, through example and demonstration. all highborn girls have lessons with a septa, not least to occupy them while the boys are practicing hitting each other with swords. sansa and arya were also given lessons with maester luwin, which is a significant advantage that not all highborn girls get. and honestly this solid foundation gave sansa and arya the tools they needed to survive thus far!!

catelyn was expecting sansa (and arya!) to continue her education at court, under the supervision of ned and with the help of septa mordane. and cersei did try to educate her in her own terrible way––catelyn could not have known how incompetent cersei was (honestly cersei had robert killed in an incredibly sophisticated way that would still be hard to prove in real court, she is a lot more together in the first book). ned resolved to end the betrothal as soon as he saw what joffrey was like, he definitely believed revealing joffrey's parentage would make this easy.

margaery came to king's landing with an army at her back, knowing there was a possibility, however slim, of the lannisters rejecting an alliance. she knew she was entering a city her family had been starving out for months!! she brought food!!! she was prepared. she knew exactly what she was getting into!! loras had almost definitely been feeding the tyrells information about the court for years, if only so they'd know what was going on lol.

the tyrells are absolutely the lannisters' foils, I think that's pretty clear? margaery is the political powerhouse cersei wants to be, and she has the support and respect cersei craves. loras is the new Best Tourney Knight who mostly lives up to the ideals jaime strives for without really trying, and his relationship actually is unfairly discriminated against instead of just creepy (affectionate). willas is the scholarly heir trusted absolutely, like his claim is so rock solid he is just left with the castle, and he has a more 'socially acceptable' disability (in tyrion's mind especially!). like they are both engaged to sansa even. and olenna is who tywin thinks he is, except she also has the power of being a reasonable adult who would prefer that people (not joffrey) didn't get hurt. then garlan is just a good guy, all the lannisters wish they had a garlan

for the record, also, sansa tried to 'talk up' joffrey because she was terrified. she does not like anything about joffrey at this point and is desperately trying to think of things to say that won't get her killed?? what olenna and margaery do so well, and what is indicative of their strength as politicians and the power of being nice to people, is put sansa at ease enough that she's willing to tell them the truth. like yes sansa was fully deluding herself at one point, accepting joffrey's apology for lady's death, but she starts to hate him as soon as he has ned arrested (and their household killed??). how many of us can say we have not gone a little delusional over a crush in middle school regardless of what our parents taught us. lmao.

cat and ned may not have prepared sansa to be queen but they are the reason alayne is still kind, and that is why she inspires the kind of loyalty littlefinger can't, which will prove to be her greatest weapon.

[amethysttribble]

Edmure judging Mae's taste in secret boyfriends because if he's gonna have one he should be dating someone cooler than that is cracking me up lol. "The problem isn't that he's gay, it's that Maglor is lame!" Like I'm actually snickering slightly audibly.

Edmure cares a lot of about his brother! He wants him to be happy! To be with someone worthy! Someone cool! And- it must be said- someone who probably fits the Westerosi idea of what the romanticized (? might not be the word I'm looking for) mlm relationship look like in Westeros.

Because I think it's worth noting that- contrary to the show's non-canon exaggerated violence around queerness- in the books there's generally a very quiet 'do not talk about this' kind of... not acceptance. But it was Barristan Selmy, the perfect old man knight himself, who said, "All of King Aegon's children married for love."

He included Prince Daeron and Jeremy Norridge in that.

And comments are made about Oberyn 'bedding both men and women', but it's not given special attention, it's part of his outlandish personality that he has relations with men openly, like he was also a sellsword and a poisoner and has eight bastard daughters and a lover who is a bastard. Ellaria being a bastard and also near his wife is treated as just as, if not more, scandalous. (Though I imagine that's because they're OPEN about their relationship)

It all strikes me as the culture in westeros treating queerness as more of a 'hush hush, inconvenient eccentricity' than any kind of scornful sin. At least, not in the way the show portrayed it. I don't imagine everyone is kind- I have Maglor say as much and Loras imply as much- but we do have quite a few implied historical accounts of gay relationships and that says to me that there's probably a... literary tradition in Westeros about 'warriors' who share a bond deeper than any man can share with a woman.

A 'classical' romance being a concept that exists in Westeros.

And I think most people who have clocked Maedhros as gay (including Catelyn and Edmure) categorize him like that. Edmure especially I think sees it as like... a knightly tale and is COUNFOUNDED and offended by Maglor being a bard asalk;fjsfd.

Catelyn perceives Maedhros choosing to marry a Frey girl as a similar kind of hard but necessary reality of life as she was expected to to fill, 'duty, family, honor', being married off to people she scarcely knew in a far away place, stripped of agency and choice for her family's gain (it's not a perfect analogy, but it makes her feels kinship with him)

That's the thing. As long as he doesn't do anything CRAZY like choose not to marry (cough Blackfish cough) and eschew his duties to House Tully in producing an heir, and keeps his affairs *quiet* its only tad more scandalous than him having a long term lover whose a woman.

Anything more than that would not be met with the same quiet acceptance.

And that, I think, is the cruel part. People look at Maedhros (and Renly, and Loras, and Oberyn) and think: you can have your eccentricities and indulgences, as long as they're quiet and don't interfere with what polite society expects of you.

So yeah... not violent and angry kind of rejection, but a quieter, cold kind.

ANYWAY you didn't ask for this rant! Was just on my mind. Thanks for sparking the thoughts!

[fromtheseventhhell]

I will say that it’s not surprising for book Sansa fans to dislike GRRM’s writing because he doesn’t write her coherently at all, and treats her as more of a camera than anything. Not to mention he pairs her with too many much older men (I hate Sansa’s ships but GRRM clearly write Sansan as romantic). I’ve always thought that GRRM’s writing for Sansa’s chapters is some of his weakest. He doesn’t know how to handle this character. But her fans can’t admit that because then they would be admitting that the parts they love from the books is all the headcanons they made up instead of just being like “yeah I made up someone more interesting and complex because the book is weak and shallow in this area”. That’s why Sansa fans actively get offended when people bring up canon moments and canon quotes from her arc that go against the delusional metas they’ve read.

I have to agree, although for me the issue is with Sansa's characterization itself rather than the quality of writing in her chapters. I think George has done a great job with writing the plot surrounding her and she offers an interesting perspective on things, similar to how we get Catelyn's POV on Robb's war. The issue is that George expanded her role but he doesn't seem to have a solid idea of what he wants to do with her character. She hasn't become more active with her increased story presence. She does have moments that influence the plot but most of those aren't intentional and come in the form of her revealing information to the wrong person (i.e. telling Cersei of Ned's plans and Dontos of the Tyrells'). She hasn't learned or grown as much as her "peers" have and a lot of her chapters do have her used as a "camera" to show what's going on with non-POV characters. I think her character gets overshadowed by the plots she's involved in. George uses her to introduce and hide the plotting of others which is interesting to read, but it also leaves Sansa in a position where she just isn't meant to grow and learn like other characters. If we knew about, say, Littlefinger's true intentions from the very beginning then things wouldn't be as interesting.

To me, her strongest characterization was in AGOT, which makes sense because her role in that book is the one George created her for. She got to be directly contrasted with Arya and overall, I think her relationships with other characters are where we've seen her grow the most. I hate how George has written her relationships with all of these older men, but I do think her relationships with them (platonic) are an interesting showcase of her character. With Sandor and Tyrion, for example, we see Sansa confronting her shallow ideas of beauty and knighthood. With Littlefinger, he uses her as a pawn and manipulates her, but he's also teaching her and potentially handing her the tools of his own undoing. The issue is that a lot of people don't look at how she's actually written and assign her growth she doesn't have. I can understand the urge and I genuinely believe that if Sansa had the same level of growth as others, she would be one of the best characters in the books. She will undoubtedly continue to grow in the last two books but for where the fandom wants her to be, George would need to give her four books worth of development in a few chapters which seems...unlikely.

I do agree that there's an issue with her stans getting angry when confronted with the book content. I've had people get upset with me for simply mentioning that Sansa was a part of LF's plot to poison SW. Her stans want her to simultaneously be the smartest character in the books while also being the purest, most naive character in existence. If you "insult" her intelligence then you're misogynistic but saying that she knows something that she was basically outright told is also bad. A really frustrating attitude that comes from her stans being unhappy with how she's actually written in the books. I think a lot of it comes from people wanting her book plot to line up with the show, but there's just no way that's happening. The sooner her stans come to terms with that and learn to like how she's actually written, the better.

[ladycatofwinterfell]

🌹

This one is a finished fic. I wrote it, but then I got too self conscious to post it because I thought no one would want to read it. It takes place in my modern au and it’s Robb worrying he’s actually Brandon’s son and talking about it with Cat. And then some nedcat <3

When Catelyn’s mug was almost empty Robb still had yet to touch his. She would have been able to touch the silence, it was that dense. He had tried several times to begin talking and had failed every time.

She glanced on Robb’s phone as a notification made the screen light up, saw the time.

“You said you wanted to talk before Dad came home, he’ll be be home in fifteen minutes” she said.

She didn’t want to pressure him, whatever he wanted to talk about was something that was a big deal to him. It was very obvious. Catelyn really wished to know what it was that made him so, but that was impossible unless he told her. Was it something she had done? Would he tell her she had been a terrible mother to him through all his life?

“Fifteen minutes?” Robb said, surprised. “Gods, has it been that long?”

He ran a hand through his auburn curls, made them even messier than they had already been. His hand then went to his beard, stroking it. It made him look so grown. Well, he was grown. Grown enough to have a wife and kids.

“Yes. So if you have something you want to say to me you should say it now.”

Hearing herself say that made her more nervous. She wrapped both her hands around the mug in front of her on the table to keep herself from fiddling with them.

Robb sighed, something that reminded her a lot of his father. The Starks had a way of sighing as if they carried the entire world upon their shoulders, so deeply it was a wonder they had that much air in their lungs. A long, almost miserable sigh.

“Look, we both know Aunt Lya got maybe a little too drunk at the party” he said.

His hand was still stroking his beard and his blue eyes were fixed on hers. They had the same eyes, Ned had loved telling her that when Robb was little.

“I don’t think that escaped anyone’s notice.”

“Yeah, no, but as I was helping Jon get her into a cab she… uhm, well, she began talking about something.”

Catelyn felt herself frown.

What had Lyanna said? What was there to say that had stuck with Robb that much? Something that had to do with Catelyn. Or Ned.

“What was she talking about?” Catelyn asked.

Her son gave an uncomfortable chuckle at that.

“Slurred, really” he said. “She mentioned you and Uncle Brandon.”

That she had been with Brandon before Ned wasn’t her proudest achievement, but it was also no secret. Everyone knew. The kids knew, they had known for a long time. But it was all in the past, nothing that needed to be considered further than so. Brandon was nothing but her brother-in-law and at times it felt like it had always been that way.

“You already knew I was… acquainted with Brandon before I knew your father.”

Had it been possible to keep them in the dark about that she would have done it. She didn’t want the family to be more messed up than perfectly necessary, their mother having been with their uncle before their father was unneeded.

Robb looked down at the coffee mug in front of him and coughed.

“But I don’t think I ever knew just how close in time those two relationships were. Aunt Lya knew that.”

Unfortunately they had overlapped with a single day. None of them had meant for it to be that way, but it was the truth. Not that it mattered anymore. None of that mattered anymore, why was Robb asking about it? What had Lyanna said? Lyanna didn’t even know there had been an overlap, no one but she and Ned knew there had been an overlap. They hadn’t told anyone about that first time. As far as everyone else was aware it had just been close in time.

“Does it matter?”

She heard that her voice sounded a little strained. She wished he had wanted to talk about something else.

“It matters to me because I was born nine months after you and Dad met” Robb answered simply.

It could have been a comfort that he sounded as pained as she felt, though it wasn’t. On the contrary it just felt like that made everything worse.

“Where do you want to come with this, Robb?”

She suspected what it was, but she needed him to say it.

Her hands were wrapped tightly around the mug and she had to remind herself to breathe. It was stupid, she didn’t know why it affected her so much. She knew the answer to what it was he wondered and she knew that answer was the one they both wanted. There would be no uncomfortable truths. Still there was a stone on her chest. She wished he never would have had any doubt in the first place.

“I want to know if Dad really is my real father.”

It was clear that he was forcing out the words, that he was struggling with it.

“He is” she simply said.

Robb sighed that Stark signature sigh again, leaned back in his chair and looked at her again. He grabbed his mug with both hands, the way she had done.

“You don’t need to tell me what I want to hear. And if Dad doesn’t know the truth I promise not to tell–“

Catelyn felt the need to interrupt him before he could go any further.

“You’re his biological son, Robb, it’s not just something I say.”

“I don’t mean to doubt you, but are you sure?”

She let go of her mug, leaned forward and reached over the table. She took one of his hands into the both of hers and squeezed it lightly.

“We took a paternity test just after you were born. Your father didn’t think it was necessary, but I insisted.”

Waiting for the results had been the longest and most excruciating few days of her life. And she had given birth five times and lost both her parents. She had been terrified of losing Ned because she had a baby that belonged to his brother, and even more terrified of the notion that maybe he would stay with her even if it was that way. Out of some sense of duty. Because she had trapped him with Brandon’s baby. The relief when the results came back had also been the greatest of her life.

Robb snorted.

Why?”

“He said it didn’t matter to him, that you were his either way, but I had to know. I didn’t want to force another man’s child upon him. And the test came back saying you were his child, so everything was fine. You don’t have to worry.”

Both of them flinched when they heard the front door open.

It had not been fifteen minutes, Ned was a little early. That very rarely happened.

“Hello!” he called.

“Robb’s here, we’re in the kitchen!” Catelyn called back.

She let go of his hand, sat straight in her chair again.

Robb was still quite torn about it, it was obvious, though there was also a relief there. He was much calmer than he had been before. Even took a sip from his mug, the coffee had to be lukewarm at that point.

“Thanks, Mom” he said when he lowered it again.

“You have no reason to thank me.”

There was nothing she needed to be thanked for.

They sat in silence for a bit, a much more comfortable silence that time, before Ned came into the room.

For a moment Catelyn looked at Robb instead of at Ned. Saw how he smiled as he looked at his father, how the relief was joined by happiness.

“Hey, Dad” he said.

“Hey, son. Didn’t know you were coming over.”

Ned leaned against the doorframe, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I was in the area so i though I’d stop by. Jeyne and the kids are coming too, Mom invited us for dinner.”

She had done no such thing, but she would gladly have them over for dinner, so she didn’t point that out. The house was so empty and quiet when it was just her and Ned, ever since Rickon moved out it had felt too big.

“It feels like you’re growing tired of me” Ned said.

“That’s not true! I just want to see my son and my grandkids.”

“Our son and our grandkids, mind you.”

As if he had known what they were talking about just before he came there.

He came over to her, leaned down and gave her a quick kiss while Robb pretended he had seen something very interesting outside the window.

“Now, did Mom plan what to make for dinner?” Ned asked when he was standing upright again.

He put a hand on her shoulder and the other on the top of the backrest of her chair.

“She didn’t, it was a very spontaneous invite” she told him. “But I’m pretty sure we can come up with something.”

“I can ask Jeyne to get groceries on the way if you want to” Robb offered.

“No, that’s not necessary” Ned said after having considered for a moment. “I have an idea.”

“Okay.”

Ned nodded before leaving the room. Not much later they could hear the stairs creak as he went upstairs.

“Right” Robb said. “Guess I should call Jeyne and tell her we’re invited to dinner.”

He reached for his phone and opened it.

“Tell her you invited yourself to dinner” Catelyn snorted.

Robb waved a hand in a small circle.

“Technicalities.”

Just as he was about to hit the call button Catelyn felt the urge to say something more. Ned had interrupted them, after all.

“He was right, you know” she said softly.

“What?”

“It wouldn’t have mattered what the test said, he was always your father. He decided that you were his son the moment he knew you existed, and he wouldn’t have wavered even if you turned out to be Brandon’s biologically. So there was never any doubt about who your real father was.”

When tears began rising in his eyes Robb tried to blink them away. He was doing pretty well considering everything.

“Okay.”

His voice broke when he said it and he began wiping the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand rather aggressively.

“Fuck” he mumbled.

“Language.”

That put a small smile on his face despite everything.

~*~

“What’s weighing on you?” Ned asked as he joined her in the bed.

“Nothing” she responded simply. “Just tired.”

Internally she sighed. She had believed she had been doing so well with pretending like nothing had happened.

“Really?”

He had a way of looking at people as if he saw right through them. Catelyn knew he didn’t, he wasn’t insanely good at reading people. He just had a way of making it seem like it. He made people nervous. Not her, not anymore. But then and there she felt it.

She put her phone on her nightstand and moved closer to him, let him wrap his arms around her. She settled with her head on his shoulder, putting her hand above his heart so that she could feel his heartbeat against her palm. It was calming.

“Yeah, really. Kids are a handful now when I’m used to peace and quiet.”

She would never grow used to the peace and quiet.

Ned turned his head and pressed his face against her temple, burying his face in her hair.

“For some reason I don’t believe that” he mumbled.

He knew her too well after thirty years together.

Maybe it was better to let him know, too. It wasn’t like there had actually been a problem, he was Robb’s biological father. Even as Robb hadn’t wanted him to be aware about his concerns it had to with him.

“Lyanna-said-something-to-Robb-last-week-that-made-him-question-if-you-really-were-his-biological-father.”

She spoke so quickly that the sentence became a single long word. She hadn’t planned to, it had just come out that way.

The silence that followed seemed to last an eternity.

“What?”

Ned pulled away from her slightly, just enough to be able to look at her. His frown told her that he hadn’t understood a word of what she had said.

Catelyn took a deep breath, forced herself to calm down a little.

“When Lyanna got shitfaced last week she said something to Robb that made him question if you really were his biological father.”

That time the words didn’t blend together, she sounded completely understandable. At least to herself.

“What did she say?” Ned asked, his voice a little cooler than it had been before.

He was still frowning, but he no longer looked as confused.

“I don’t know exactly, but it was something that made him aware of how… close the end of my relationship with Brandon was to the beginning of my relationship with you. And since we, skilled as we are, managed to make ourselves a kid first try without trying, he wondered if there was any possibility of that he was actually Brandon’s.”

Ned sighed. A long, deep, Stark signature sigh. He did it so well. Even better than all the rest of them.

“Lyanna and her big mouth” he said afterwards. “I’ll have to talk to her about that, it’s none of her business. What did you say to Robb?”

There was no lack of annoyance in his words.

“I told him the truth. That we did a paternity test and that you were confirmed to be his father. What else was there to say?”

“Don’t know. Gods, I hate all of this.”

The shame that washed over her could not be denied. It was all her fault. She was the common factor.

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t blame you. It isn’t just your fault, I was a part of it too.”

“It’s just that sometimes you wish Brandon didn’t know me before you did?”

“I never would have known you if it wasn’t for Brandon. It had to happen this way.”

There was something sweet in that way of thinking of it. That the way it started couldn’t have been so bad because it led them to something so good.

“I wouldn’t have been here, I wouldn’t have had you and the kids and the grandkids” he continued. “But I do wish I had known you first.”

“If it helps I also wish I had known you first, it would have been easier.”

He leaned closer to her and kissed her.

“We can’t change what happened” he then said. “But we can be happy now.”

[jackoshadows]

Jon Snow and Arya Stark are the only ones of the current generation to have the Stark look - the long face, brown hair and grey eyes. They are also the two Starks who think of and mention Ned Stark the most, follow his guidance and advice. They often mention their ‘Father’s bannermen’ and actively participate in plots to help house Stark despite not having a lot of power or agency to do so (Arya at Harrenhal and Jon Snow with Stannis and the Karstarks). They are the two Starks who embody Ned’s vision of house Stark the most.

Jon remembered something his father had said once. A wall is only as strong as the men who stand behind it.

A lord may love the men that he commands, he could hear his lord father saying, but he cannot be a friend to them. One day he may need to sit in judgment on them, or send them forth to die.

“The map is not the land, my father often said.

“My lord father said he never ate half so well as when visiting the clans.”

“My lord father used to tell me that a man must know his enemies. We understand little of the wights and less about the Others. We need to learn.”

“My lord father used to say a man should never draw his sword unless he means to use it.”

He might have known them anyway, just by the way they stood. A good lord must know his men, his father had once told him and Robb, back at Winterfell.  - Jon, ASoIaF

--------

I should kill them myself. Whenever her father had condemned a man to death, he did the deed himself with Ice, his greatsword. “If you would take a man’s life, you owe it to him to look him in the face and hear his last words,” she’d heard him tell Robb and Jon once.

Tell me what to do, you gods,” she prayed.

Then, so faintly, it seemed as if she heard her father’s voice. “When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives,” he said.

Last night she’d had a bad dream, a terrible dream. She couldn’t remember what she’d dreamed of now, but the feeling had lingered all day. If anything, it had only gotten stronger. Fear cuts deeper than swords. She had to be strong now, the way her father told her.

Her father used to say that a lord needed to eat with his men, if he hoped to keep them. “Know the men who follow you,” she heard him tell Robb once, “and let them know you. Don’t ask your men to die for a stranger.” - Arya, ASoIaF

It’s Jon and Arya who idealize Ned Stark the man, who measure their actions against their father’s and often times come up short.

“Jon did not know that he could tell honor from shame anymore, or right from wrong. Father forgive me.”   - Jon, ASoS

Arya told of Yoren and their escape from King’s Landing as well, and much that had happened since, but she left out the stableboy she’d stabbed with Needle, and the guard whose throat she’d cut to get out of Harrenhal. Telling Harwin would be almost like telling her father, and there were some things that she could not bear having her father know. Arya, ASoS

It’s Ned who gives Arya courage and strength when she falters, who tells her “When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives.” Words she follows as she tries to find her pack. It’s Ned’s teaching and advice that Jon uses to plan Stannis’ campaign in the North.

Arya’s relationship with her mother is more complicated by Catelyn’s desire for her to be a fundamentally different person. Jon does not have a mother figure in the story, however, it’s interesting that growing up the only positive female influence in his life is Arya Stark (Well, apart from Old Nan - though I doubt Old Nan did much parenting apart from storytime!).

This is subconsciously reflected in the girls he admires, befriends and loves (He compares Ygritte physically to Arya, he compares Ygritte and Alys’ personality to Arya’s) as much as his contempt for Catelyn is reflected in the disdain he shows for what he considers to be the typical Westerosi lady who hold high regard for propriety and societal norms.

A warrior princess, he decided, not some willowy creature who sits up in a tower, brushing her hair and waiting for some knight to rescue her. - Jon, ADwD

GRRM seems to be playing around with an Oedipal Complex for Jon Snow in that he keeps comparing the girls he is attracted towards and admires with Arya and Arya is a mini Lyanna according to the characters who know both Arya and Lyanna. Jon and Arya are close because Arya is like Lyanna in terms of personality and looks. Jon of course does not know this, however, he is more or less getting to know his mother through his relationship with Arya. This is the GRRM approved world book art for Lyanna and Arya:

Arya Stark in KL                                   Lyanna Stark at Harrenhal

“Lyanna might have carried a sword, if my lord father had allowed it. You remind me of her sometimes. You even look like her.” - Arya, AGoT

It’s Lyanna’s son who admires Arya for who she is, Lyanna’s son who defies his father, secretly arms Arya and gifts her a sword - Needle, symbolic of the bond between them.

As an aside, Arya (A Lyanna look alike) has the closest bond with Rhaegar’s son, Jon Snow and also has a friendship and something brewing with Robert’s son Gendry Waters while on the run, a point to note when one considers what happened with Lyanna, Robert and Rhaegar.

Mothers and sons, fathers and daughters. Something to consider about these bonds of love and friendship between the younger generation when one looks back on the everything that happened in the past.

[bluebellhairpin]

Please use this as an excuse to ramble and talk about your got oc and Sannem!

An excuse to talk about Sandor and my selfship oc? You don't have to tell me twice! (BEWARE. I DIDN'T HOLD BACK LOL)

They're both actually so special to me, but I haven't given myself a chance to really think about them. I do know that their relationship doesn't change the plot a whole lot - however because all my oc's are female I like having them do something to further the plot. I just haven't decided what exactly that is for her yet.

Well I do know one thing, but I'll talk about it later. What I'm mostly trying to get at is I know more fixed lore about the oc than the relationship she has with Sandor. A lot of it is still up in the air lol.

Over the course of her life she gets four nicknames. They progress from The Mouse -> The Thousand Times Bitten -> The Bitch -> The Untouched. (Link are to other post's I've made about why she's called that, and at what point she gets them. BUT THIS IS GOING TO GO WAAAAY MORE INTO THAT.)

I think I mentioned it in the description for The Mouse, but if she was in the show we'd first meet her at Winterfell. She runs errands, and her manner is likened to a field mouse. She knows the Starks, and probably would be around the crowd feasting when King Robert Baratheon visits. I can imagine her catching Sandor sometime then, and perhaps also on the road again a bit later - something clicks and they're friendly enough for acquaintances.

I can imagine her turning into an envoy for Robb during the War of Five Kings. She knows all the routes everywhere, especially in the North and around the Vale, and knows how to keep hidden - whether it be in crowds or empty spaces. It would be this envoy work that leads her to the house of Ramsay Snow. She's caught there, unable to leave. Eventually Ramsay chooses to hunt her, and she almost makes it out of the woods when his hounds get her. She bares her back to the dogs. When the others find her, they leave her there, saying that if she survives the night on her own, she'd be The Thousand Times Bitten.

She does survive, or at least that's what's told since the next morning she wasn't where they left her. Really she was picked up by a farmer and his wife who were coming home late. They nurse her back to full health over the next few weeks, however she cannot stand hounds anymore.

Eventually she leaves. She refuses to be a burden to the family anymore, intent to meet up with Catelyn and Robb Stark. Really though she wanders for a while instead. Eventually she meets Sandor again, and sees Arya. Right as they meet, Arya said that her mother and brother both died the night before, and seeing as she has nowhere else to go, she joins them both. The trio get along well, but during this time is when she starts being called The Bitch. Time with Ramsay has caused what once was sweet to turn bitter, and while before she might have laughed off curse actions and comments she becomes more violent, lacking in self preservation. This and her fondness for Sandor, and his fondness for her, garners her a new name.

She travels with Sandor and Arya until they all meet Brienne of Tarth. She gets lost among the fight. She finds Arya walking towards the road and asks what happened to Sandor. Arya replies that he's dead (at least to her), and she believes it. She's unable to bring herself to go see for herself and instead makes her way back North to the Wall. She meets Jon Snow, who is Lord Commander of the Watch, and uses that time to be taught how to fight properly.

She offers to join Jon on the trip to Hardhome, but he denies saying that she isn't experienced enough, and won't risk her life there. She spends all that time training more, to prove she could've gone. During this time she discovers a fondness for using two blades which are slightly smaller then swords. These become her weapons of choice.

When Jon dies at Castle Black, she is one of the people drawn outside by Ghost's howls. After he's brought back to life, she chooses to join him in leaving as the Wall was never a place for a woman. This plan is foiled when Sansa Stark shows up. In the days the follow, a letter comes from Ramsay goading them to fight him for Winterfell. She is eager to join in, having sworn to see Ramsay die for what he'd done to her, and now to Sansa - and threatened to do again.

She fights at the Battle of the Bastards, and lives without a scratch on her. The training from the Watch paid off. She rises that day as The Untouched - a name garnered from her days at Castle Black, since the moment training moved from pretend swords to real ones, no one could land a blow on her - and now a name solidifying her into a battle legend.

Staying true to her promise, she watches as Sansa sets Ramsay's hounds on himself. Sansa walks away, but she stays. She promised she'd see him die - really she wanted to do it herself, to feel his blood warm her hands, but watching the life leave him was really the only thing she wanted to do before she died. Now her life was no longer in service to herself. Now she was ready to serve someone else again.

Lo and behold, once again there is now a King in the North.

AND THAT'S ALL I HAVE SO FARRRRRRR <3 (I could write more, since I have seen a few more seasons since I decided on all this, but this post is getting loooooooong. So if you've lasted this long I'm giving you a nice cup of tea and/or hot chocolate and kissing ur forehead THANK YOU SO MUCH I LOVE YOU <3333)

[esther-dot]

I know some people are seeing jonsa in Kit's speech about his "Freudian complex" and what he seeks in a partner (which honestly same LOL 🤡🤡). But at the same time, and knowing that he did enjoy the Ygritte-Jon relationship, it seems curious to me that he's associating Dany and Ygritte with Cat who, as he said, "hated him". I don't know if I make sense?? Lol

That Freudian comment really did make me 👀

I transcribed what he said for context.

In response to a question about Jon finding room in his heart for love again:

"Uh, yea--I hope so. I hope there will be. The funny think about--I said this earlier as well. In thinking about Jon and his choice of women which is (audience laughter). I think he's like...his maternal, the only maternal figure he had was Catelyn who hated him. Treated him like--I swear a lot. I'm sorry--who treated him like crap, alright? And he tends to go for really dominant women. It's quite interesting isn't it? He goes for the really d-- (stops himself). And I think that there's some Freudian thing going on there. Um, with that in mind I think he would go for a s-- (stops himself). I think especially the Ygritte thing burned him so much that he has definite PTSD and truma about being in a relationship, so I think it would be tough. Yeah."

(from this video that @starwarsprincess1986 posted)

I find it a really odd statement considering what he’s said in the past. I can interpret it in a few ways. It could just mean he’s attracted to women who have some authority over him. But he did include hate and mistreatment in his thoughts about Cat and pairing and connecting that vie the Freudian reference to Ygritte and Dany…well, it is kinda an understandable assertion given how s7-8 went. Kit didn’t have a say in what was written but had to perform it, so where D&D may have chosen a path for commercial reasons, without it actually making sense character-wise, Kit tried to create a believable emotional interpretation. As in, Dany treated Jon pretty badly (by taking him prisoner), and he inexplicably fell in love with her. Dany treated him worse in s8 and he inexplicably remained loyal. If that’s the story given to Kit, he might think, well shit, Ygritte also took Jon prisoner, Ygritte demanded his loyalty (as did Dany), Ygritte threatened him (as did Dany), Ygritte felt betrayed by him (as did Dany), and Ygritte shot him (Tyrion and Arya tell him Dany is gonna kill him), so, he might think Jon is choosing women who have some power in the dynamic/he can’t escape (like Cat), who he admires in some way/wants something from (maternal love from Cat, info from Ygritte, dragons /armies from Dany), and then think that he gives into these women because where Cat firmly rejected him, Ygritte and Dany did soften and express interest. It’s possible he saw the power imbalance in Jon/Dany and Jon/Ygritte, the emotional abuse, and thinks it’s a pattern in which Jon was conditioned to want love from a woman he feared. I really like Cat so this is all making me very uncomfy 😬

Like you, that doesn’t fit with how I’ve heard him speak of Ygritte, but I was really caught off guard by the fact that he mentioned not only Cat’s hate but that she treated him like crap which, why is that on his mind when describing Jon’s romantic relationships? If he saw show Ygritte that way, it would shock me? But in a different part, he’s talking about how kind/good his wife is and how odd it was to have her switch from being his sweet gf to acting Ygritte…who (I think he said) would chew his face off in a scene 😂 It did seem to indicate he didn’t consider all the J/Y banter totally harmless/cute. Maybe years later he sees it as somewhat toxic? Maybe he’s been reading the books to prep for the sequel and that’s influencing him? 🤔

I don't know if he made any or all those connections, it may have been a very broad, Cat was strong-willed and Ygritte and Dany are too, meaning. The comments about Cat’s feelings and behavior could have been a little detour, but he did mention the trauma and PTSD from his time with Ygritte as well. That could have been strictly about how both Ygritte and Dany died in his arms and how Jon feels responsible for that (Kit mentioned something like that post s8), but the fact that he feels that way about Cat and brought her into the convo…it felt like an indicator that he knows the relationships were a little fucked up.

I know I always thought that craving the approval and love of Cat had kinda transferred to Sansa and that her acceptance of Jon as a Stark (telling him he was a Stark to her, offering him the Lord’s chambers, dressing him like Ned…) was probably the most healing experience of his life. Not only because she looked like Cat, but because at the time, she was the only surviving Stark, and she had never been close to him so it wasn’t a continuation from childhood, but totally unexpected acceptance. That all became messy, but it still seems more clearly delineated in the show (they even mention Sansa sitting in Cat’s seat once) then his interactions with Ygritte or Dany. I’m not sure what to think, anon, but I agree, it was a really interesting quote! I’ll try to watch the rest of the video sometime and see if there’s anything else to add context to it.