#but his scenes with jon always have this sort of darker edge to them

[mkstrigidae]

APWH preview snippet!

Since I'm actively trying to work on getting the next few chapters out, I thought I'd share a little future scene with some hints of Jonsa with all you lovely people! This bit is from like, a few chapters in the future bc it's the in-between that's giving me fits right now :) (Fair warning: this is unedited and subject to change! That being said, it's such a fun scene that I can't imagine ever nixing it :D)

“Does he even know that they have to avoid the press?”

“For the last time-“ Sam sighed, sounding completely exasperated, “Dickon knows what they can and can’t do- he’s got enough practice not being photographed from when our dad was the secretary. Not to mention spending time around you when that exposé on your crazy grandfather came out two years ago.”

“I just-“ Jon sighed, blowing a stray curl out of his face. “You didn’t see how freaked out she was when the press caught us at that performance in White Harbor. I thought she was going to have a full-blown panic attack.”

He was immediately derailed by Gilly plopping little Sam down in his lap and shoving a bottle into his hands.

“What’s this all about?” he raised a brow, adjusting the baby on his lap, allowing him to latch onto the cuff of his flannel shirt and start gnawing at the fabric. “You going somewhere?”

Gilly shot him a withering look, but he saw the amusement in her eyes.

“I-“ she gestured, imperiously, “Have not had time by myself to shower all week-“

“Sorry, love.” Sam winced, looking up from his pile of paperwork. “I can take a break from these-“

“Not your fault, Sam.” she waved him off. “You warned me about this conference at the beginning of the summer.” a grin played at the corners of her mouth. “Besides, it works out well- Jon needs a distraction right now from the fact that Sansa’s on a date with your extremely hot and conventionally attractive brother.”

“Hey!” Sam looked wounded, and Gilly rolled her eyes, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

“You know you’re my favorite Tarly.” she wrinkled her nose. “How long have you been working on this presentation? You smell like the baby spit up on you.”

“Guess I’m next in line for showers.” Sam said, mournfully. “Unless-“

“Nope- I need my own time right now, Samwell. Did you even hear what I said about why Jon’s bent out of shape?”

Jon had known Gilly since Sam and she had met up north while the two of them were in college. Sometimes, it was hard to reconcile the timid, scared girl she had been with the woman who was currently devoting all of her remaining energy to busting his balls.

“Don’t tell me you’re worried about Sansa with my brother.” Sam snorted, shotgunning another cup of coffee next to him the way Jon was used to seeing undergrads do with jaeger shots. “I mean, this is Dickon we’re talking about. Used to bring wounded animals home to take care of them Dickon? The same guy who cried when we had movie night and Gilly and Rhae wanted to go see ‘Love, Simon’?” He shook his head. “Look, as far as guys she could be out on a date with right now go, Dickon’s kind of the best case scenario. She’ll have a nice time, and he’ll be a perfect gentleman.”

Jon blinked at him, silently turning to look up at Gilly, who rolled her eyes and sighed.

“You’re hopeless, sweetie.” she kissed him on the forehead again, wrinkling her nose. “He’s not worried that things will go wrong- he’s worried they’ll go a little too well.”

“You’ve been spending way too much time around my sister.” Jon muttered, narrowly avoiding little Sam’s grasping reach for his glasses, managing to get the baby to latch onto the bottle before he destroyed any more of Jon’s eyewear. “You even sounded like her just then.”

Sam blinked for a second, his head whipping between Jon and Gilly.“You’re jealous?” He asked, incredulously. “Of Dickon? Wait- you like Sansa?”

“Got there in the end.” Gilly sighed, affectionately patting him on the shoulder before going to shower, leaving Jon and Sam behind with four cups of coffee, one baby, and approximately five brain cells total between the two of them.

“You like her.” Sam repeated, like it was a giant revelation.

“What are we- in middle school?” Jon hissed, immediately turning his head down to smile and make faces at little Sam while he fed him, before glaring up at big Sam again. “I don’t- I mean-“

Sam was just shaking his head.“Of course you do.” he laughed. “Should have guessed- red hair and a damsel in distress? You were doomed from the outset.”

“Shut up.” Jon muttered, flushing. “It’s not like that.”

“Then why are you worrying about Dickon for fu-“ Sam glanced nervously at the baby, “-god’s sake? When Gill was meeting my family for the first time, I remember you told her not to worry- that my brother was ‘one of the best guys you know’ and ‘practically a golden retriever’.”

Jon could tell that Sam, who could not raise one eyebrow without the other, was desperately trying to do just that.

“I don’t know.” He muttered, moving little Sam to his shoulder to start burping him. “Look- I’m attracted to her, alright? It’s a fu- er, a giant disaster that I’m gonna ignore for the rest of my life.”

“Seriously?”

“Stop trying to do that with your eyebrows.” Jon complained. “It’s giving me motion sickness. And yes, seriously. I’m not even going to consider that- it’s just a stupid crush. Besides,” he sighed, rubbing little Sam’s back comfortingly, “Robb’s already dealing with enough right now with this whole Sansa situation- can’t imagine telling him I think his sister’s attractive while he’s being forced to suddenly confront all of his guilt and self loathing every time he looks at her.”

“That whole bro code thing of never dating your friend’s sisters never really made sense to me.” Sam shook his head, gulping down more coffee. “I mean, I’d be thrilled if you decided to date Talla, because I know you’d be good to her.”

“Yeah, don't think she'd quite go for that, mate.” Jon snorted, standing to bounce little Sam around gently. He was just grateful Sam hadn’t said anything else about Robb.

“Eh, wouldn’t count you out completely.” Sam shrugged, smirking. “With that hair, you’re pretty enough to be a girl- maybe that’d be enough for her.”

“You are so lucky i’m holding the baby.” Jon muttered, still bouncing little Sam, who picked that moment to spit up spectacularly down Jon’s back.

“Well, that’s three of us who’re gonna need showers now.” Sam grinned, looking thrilled as all get out that it hadn’t been him. “Wow- his aim is getting better.”

“I’m going to remind him of this when he’s a sulky teenager.” Jon grumbled, wiping spit-up off his shoulder as best he could. “Look- no gossiping with Rhae about this, please. She thinks she’s such a good clandestine agent that she doesn’t always realize that Robb is better at sniffing out her plots than she thinks.”

“Alright-“ Sam sighed, looking back down at the massive stack of paperwork in front of him. “I make no promises for Gill, though.”

“Gilly could give some of my Uncle’s colleagues at the WIA a run for their money when it comes to withstanding interrogation.” Jon snorted.

“Probably true.”

“Where did your brother take Sansa?” Still holding onto a now much happier baby with one hand, he reached down the other to take a gulp of his own coffee.

“He said something about going out towards the Tyrell Estate.” Sam shrugged. “They probably drove out there to see the gardens- he’s said it’s a good road to take his bike out on.”

Jon promptly spat out his entire sip of coffee, staining the front of his shirt as well as the back, and frightening little Sam enough that he started to cry.

“He took her on his motorcycle?”

Gilly picked that moment to reappear, completely clean and with wet hair, blinking at the scene in front of her.

Sam, who couldn’t seem to stop laughing, was desperately trying to calm down the baby, who had started wailing, while Jon’s entire front was covered in coffee and his entire back was covered in baby vomit. Not that he seemed to notice, as his face was white and he was making a series of angry looking hand gestures at her husband.

“I really can’t leave you three alone for five minutes, can I?” she sighed. “Do I even want to know?”

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

leo!

Leo: What things will show up in every book you write? do you ever feel like a one-trick pony?

If it’s what I write, then everything I write has a happy ending, specifically one that is focused on found family. 

Like, I absolutely love tragedy as a genre. I even like unhappy endings, if it’s right for the story. But I don’t like writing them. I tend to put characters through hell to get to the ending, and I just don’t like doing that knowing they won’t make it out the other side again? Granted, not all the characters make it to the happy ending--I’m not shy of killing people off--but from an overall story perspective, I just don’t enjoy writing the struggle and the pain knowing that whatever end they’re going to have is going to be an unhappy one. 

Found family specifically tends to be my ending. I like dandelion-growing-through-concrete levels of tenacity for my relationships. The characters are going through hell, and everything hurts, but they can still find beauty and love and happiness in people. It’s my favorite ending, and I use it pretty much in everything. 

If it’s how I write, then basically everything I write (whether it be original or fanfic) has a sort of seesaw between heaviness and humor. Like, it’s not always horror, but there’s always something heavier as my general tone, and I never commit to it for the entire story. In the same way, I never commit to a story that’s supposed to be overall comedic. Usually I’m existing hard at one end of the spectrum, depending on the scene and what I’m trying to do with it.

If you use nhthcth as a model, I didn’t have a single joke whatsoever in the first two chapters. It was all horror. Because I didn’t want anyone to have any release from the tension. The subject matter was 1) heavier, Jon was a kid for the first two chapters and that is something I treat far more serious than Jon as an adult, and 2) set up the sort of tone/mystery I wanted around the young version of Jon. He was a victim of something terrible, and it’s something that you still don’t know all the details of. You know how he ends up, but you don’t know how he got there. It’s like getting to the end of a crime documentary and finding out the case remains unsolved. Whatever happened, it wasn’t good, and there’s nothing to take the edge of that. Little Jon is clever, and persistent, but he’s not some capable fighter dropping witty one-liners. He’s a kid, and a scared one at that, and I can’t flinch away from the reality of that by offering any release. 

But then when he’s an adult, I cut the tension immediately. Because this is a different Jon now, and I want you to like him. I want you to root for him. He’s flying by the seat of his pants, granted, and he should spend more time running and less time running his mouth, but he’s far more able to handle what’s coming for him than he was as a kid. I don’t want you to be actively terrified for him; I want you to be cheering him on. So seesawing hard into humor kind of releases him from his role of victim and positions him more as a player on more level ground. I could have done that without humor, granted, but I generally like to make jokes, so humor is pretty much always my vehicle for repositioning a character into a certain role. 

So basically everything I write has a really flip-flop tone, and it’s always humor on one end and dark on the other. I never do any of the more lighthearted genres, like things geared to be more comedic or romantic or just generally lighter, but I never commit hard to the darker stuff either. Am I a one trick pony? Eh, probably, but my only target audience is myself and my best friend, so I just sort of write whatever I want however I want, no matter how redundant it ends up. 

[autoclavesarchived]

dead sea | the magnus archives (ao3)

a character study of martin & depression

Martin wakes up, and doesn’t want to. This is always how it starts—the creeping fog, the wretched emptiness, the realization that he can no longer find a single reason to go through the motions of living again. It’s a slow descent. He can feel himself slipping back into that bad place again, and he is both aggressor and spectator in his passivity. On these days, he doesn’t think he can be a person even if he wants to.

(It had started the previous evening when the sun sank down. It’s so lonely out at nightfall. To look outside and see nothing else, only pinpricks of solitary light in the distance, to be the only known quantity in a sea of darkened glass. It was like the slow fade into night had bled something loose inside him.)

That had been a different kind of void, though. Less illness, more sadness, a sheet of blunt-edged melancholia. This raw, record-scratch morning is far less quantifiable and infinitely worse.

Radio static in his head. He is in so many pieces. It’s hard to keep himself together when the sun has fallen right off the edge of the world and his body now feels like the unwanted inhabitant of a car crash; no, nothing quite so violent and screaming as that. A haunted house, maybe. A muffled crime scene before its investigation.

Somewhere in the middle of this glitching mindscape, a person that Martin would like to believe is his real self cries for it to stop. This self is still alive, just—inaccessible. Quietly pigeonholed into the attic, quarantined under floorboards like a bad secret. Is there a way back home? Is there a way back to you? he thinks, blindly. There is no answer, or at least, none that he can hear. Depression, in its slow and imperceptible way, continues to take up residence inside of him.

It seems so unreasonable, but he can’t bear to even lift his head. He’s just so tired.

Outside is a riotous spring, green and pink and yellow. Last fall, when the cold set in and winter rusted shut its grip around them, he’d wanted it to be spring so badly that he would have given up anything to see it happen. A hand, an eye. A lung, even. The nights had been so long and aching then. Now, the days are, too. Outside is spring and Martin is acutely aware that it is passing him by.

Time distorts strangely when he’s like this. He wakes from the blink of a sleep-sick nap to find the sun burning too high above him, and the door creaking open; a rattle of keys being set down, plastic grocery bags rustling onto the kitchen counter, and Jon’s quick footsteps walking down the hallway.

“Martin?” he hears Jon call. “Martin? I’ve got the shopping but we should really see if—”

Their bedroom door opens, the noise of it interrupting whatever he had been about to say. It’s a little darker in here with the blinds half-turned, but not dark enough that he wouldn’t be able to see Martin lying curled on the bed.

“Martin?” he repeats, more quizzically this time.

“Jon,” Martin says. His voice is raspy from disuse, so he tries again. “Jon. Hello.”

Jon draws nearer. “Is this a bad day?” He is windswept and smells like sunlight, like the springtime he’d just been outside in, and Martin can hardly bear to look at him for envy of what he wants to be. What he couldn’t be if he tried because he is barely a person right now. But that isn’t Jon’s fault, he reminds himself very carefully. Jon is trying to take care of him. (His expression has not changed in the slightest after seeing Martin motionless on the bed, all the blankets pulled up despite how mild the day is, and he is silently thankful for it. He knows what a miserable picture this must make.)

“Yeah,” he manages. “Do you—can you… come here? Please.”

“Of course.” There’s a sweep of air, and the bed dips; Jon sliding in between the sheets unquestioningly at his appeal even though the day is in its prime and it’s only Martin’s brain being irrational and happiness-deprived.

It takes a minute, but they shift so that they’re facing each other, bodies only a few inches apart on the mattress. Martin can feel the difference of a second presence and the warmth it exudes. He can feel himself reaching for it, too, with his half-starved self. A puzzle piece, or a stray bracket looped inwards.

“Can I touch you?”

Martin nods. He desperately wants Jon to touch him. He needs to be reminded that he’s real, and that he hasn’t just made this up in his mind as a respite from the echoing wasteland of the sadness. Jon is real, and that means Martin is more than a single lonely blot on the horizon.

“Okay,” Jon whispers, and doesn’t ask anything more of him. Soon enough, Martin feels hands skim the backs of his wrists, glide up his forearms and across his shoulders. They trace the pattern of freckles on his chest, forwards and backwards. Light, undemanding touches, so quintessentially Jon in their repetitive familiarity. Eventually, he pulls him closer so that their bodies are pressed against each other in a sort of half-hug: Martin’s head tucked into the bend of Jon’s chin, one of Jon’s legs draped over his hip, their torsos a single warm line from collarbone to stomach. Jon is normally so much smaller than him, and all rangy and bird-boned to boot, but when he gets like this, his presence is expansive, comforting. Martin feels lazily enveloped in it. The whole bed smells like Jon now, aftershave and rooibos tea and something citrusy—oranges, maybe.

He lies carefully still in familiar arms, and he thinks he should feel something more about this. He thinks he should feel happier, or more grateful. It’s not that he’s not, exactly, more that he’s just… temporarily divorced from it. As if he’s looking at the feeling, or the implication of it, from a point very distant at the edge of the sky. There’s something in the way that makes it hard to directly feel anything. He is looking at the happiness of someone else’s body, and then back down at the happiness-shaped imprint on his own. The place where happiness is supposed to be, but isn’t, right now.

He tells Jon this. “I think I should feel something about this. I think I should feel something about you right now. It isn’t right that I don’t.”

(He just feels so hollow. He didn’t know absence could take up so much space inside a person. Right now, he is a tenant in his own head.)

“You don’t owe me anything, Martin,” Jon says, the steady vibration of words in his throat humming through the top of Martin’s skull. That sensation, the intimacy of it, is the closest Martin thinks he has gotten to feeling something today.

“I love you. You don’t have to answer that right now, but I just wanted you to know. When you come back, I’ll tell you again. As many times as you want.” The light stretches and slants as Jon speaks.

Martin is sometimes afraid that there is no back. There is no returning. It really does seem like this is all there is, this static on a broken loop and his mind slowing like the drip of a hospital IV. If that is true, then it’s not Jon, or even the feeling of happiness that is unreal; Martin is the imposter here. The magic trick, the illusion, the Eurydice caught between person and not. There is nowhere to go back to, because the emptiness is the only part of him that means anything.

(“I love you,” Jon had tried, over and over, achingly, the first time it happened, and finally Martin had screamed at him, “I love you can’t solve this, Jon!” They’d had a long conversation that night about love and illness and how sometimes he was so numb he could die from it. Since then, Jon only says the words because they are true, not as if they could save Martin. It might seem uncaring to anyone else, but it works for the both of them.)

I love you, Jon says now, like a fact, and Martin wants to say it back, he really does.

The figure in his head, the one that he has to believe he can go back to, tries to say it. But even in the isolation of his own mind, it only comes out as a faint I really loved you, you know. He doesn’t mean for it to mangle like that, the past tense of it softly mocking. He still loves Jon—that much is not an illusion. That much is also a fact. It’s the apathy again, leaching the feeling out of his actions and his speech. There is an I love you- shaped wound on his self and it is one he cannot quite reconcile with the love he knows he has for Jon. I really loved you, you know. And the version of me that loves you, that can love you, is still out there. Just not here. There’s all this untethered, inaccessible love here, Jon. I want to be able to feel it for you.

Jon falls asleep for a while after that. He’s still clutching at Martin, the weight and anchor of his body a welcome warmth. Martin stays awake, so he looks at Jon to fill the time.

Jon is rendered looser when he drowses. He’s more inexact somehow, edges less sharply defined and face slack, unreserved. It isn’t that he withholds on purpose, and especially not from Martin, but his defense mechanisms forget to reset themselves in sleep. It’s part of why sleeping next to him is an almost unbearable closeness all by itself—a reminder that he is trusted enough to see this. Martin reaches out with a hand, and is nearly startled when it brushes Jon’s face. He’d expected it to go right through him, for some reason. He isn’t sure whether he’d imagined himself or Jon to be the insubstantial one in this scenario, but in any case, his hand finds solid skin.

He touches his fill of Jon’s angular cheeks and cradled shoulders and pinned dark hair. He’s so beautiful, all of him. Aftershave and rooibos and oranges; it feels like a foreign landscape, but Martin is determined. He is relearning the things that make up Jon the way a man deprived of senses does.

When Jon wakes up—in fits and starts, squinting at the sun that is now slouching golden across the room—Martin embraces him and very quietly says that he’ll start putting the groceries away.

So they get out of bed together, even though Martin feels like he hasn’t walked in weeks. He lifts the bags off the counter to sit down and sort through them on the floor. It is the most human thing he’s done today.

Sorting is a quiet, menial sort of task that doesn’t require much thought, which is good, because his head is still weighted down with buzzing. He sits in the sunlight and lets the rice and orzo and tinned olives and fruit pass through his hands as he puts them on the shelves, thinking, our food, our sunlit kitchen, this is the home we have made. (I really loved you, you know. He can’t change the tense of it yet so he just repeats that word, love, until he can pretend to forget the context of it. No past, no future, just love, said like it would replace the emptiness.)

Afterwards, Jon makes them baked pasta with three different kinds of cheese. Evening paints the length of him glorious and blue. As Martin watches, he shreds thyme and basil and mixes breadcrumbs to cover the top layer the way Martin likes best; Jon, who is reasonably talented at yet notoriously opposed to the idea of cooking, does all this without batting an eye. Martin is sure he will feel something about this, too, later.

[kallypsowrites]

Are Adapted Characters Seperate from their Original Counterparts?

So here’s a post that has been on my mind for quite some time, partially because, after being in the Game of Thrones fandom pretty regularly, I see people compare the book and show characters a lot. This is understandable as changes through adaptation are inevitable and sometimes a character can be changed for the worse or for the better, depending on your preference. But today I want to address the question: should adapted characters be viewed as an EXTENSION of their book character or should they be able to stand on their own?

Before I get into the weeds of this argument, imagine you are me. I’m a seventeen year old high school student and my brother has decided to show me this rad new show which has already aired two seasons and is several months off of airing the third season. Game of Thrones. Naturally, I am excited and I dive right into watching with him. And of course I love it. I’m a fantasy nut and there’s magic and dragons but also POLITICS and really intriguing character dynamics and dialogue and moral grey areas. All the stuff I like! I know there are books of course, but I want to experience the show and be surprised as it comes out, so I hold off reading the books. In fact, I hold off reading the series all the way through until after season seven airs (in an effort to make the long wait for season 8 less painful. It didn’t work. I read too fast).

What’s important here is that for several years, the show was my ONLY CONCEPT of all of these characters. The book versions, to me, didn’t exist. All I had access to was the characters on the screen. And that’s all many of the GA has access too. Let’s face it, the books are bricks and, for that matter, dense. A lot of people aren’t going to take the time to read them, especially the strangely paced and structured book four and five. So what does that mean? The characters on the screen have to stand on their own. And therefore, you can easily argue that the onscreen characters are seperate entities.

There’s been a lot of talk in the fandom about the show creators white washing male characters and ‘greying’ female characters. That is certainly an issue worth talking about and I’m not trying to discourage that conversation, nor am I trying to say that we shouldn’t talk about adaptation changes and focus on the books and tv show as different entities. They are in conversation with each other. But I do want to address the fact that just because something is present in the book does not mean that watchers of the tv show have to acknowledge it as ‘canon’...especially if the show never mentions it. They are, in many ways, seperate, particularly since the TV show has moved ahead of the books.

Conversely, this means the TV show can’t rely on the books as part of their ‘canon’ to take short cuts. Because if it isn’t made clear in the show and can only be understood by a book reader, then the show has failed in some way. The TV show has, in fact, dropped the ball on a couple of prophesies in this way. The fact that they did not include the ‘valonqar’ section of Cersei’s prophesy takes away from her reasons for hating Tyrion and, for that matter, doesn’t guaruntee either of her brothers will be her killer. It wasn’t in the prophesy in the show, so it really doesn’t matter if it was in the books. Its not part of show canon.

Even more egregious is Mirri Maz Dur’s prophesy to Daenerys. In the books, she says that Daenerys will never bare a living child again. In the show, she does not say anything of the sort. And yet Dany says to Jon that ‘the witch who murdered her husband’ said she would never bare a child again. That’s the show straight up making something up for cheap forshadowing and if the casual watcher went back to view the first season they might be understandably confused. Even if it happens in the book IT MUST BE PRESENT IN THE SHOW in order to effect the show.

This applies to character interpretation as well. And as an example, let’s talk about Tyrion.

The Moral White Washing of Tyrion Lannister

Tyrion Lannister is one of the most commonly cited characters in the conversation about moral white washing, and with good reason. Tyrion is never the best person, but he’s certainly not the worst. Being born a dwarf, he is an underdog who has been ridiculed all his life. But he’s also his father’s son and spends much of the series manipulating people in order to gain power in King’s Landing or elsewhere. It just happens that he is a better person than a lot of the other characters surrounding him. It’s not that he’s not sympathetic, but he’s not an angel.

He, however, has a much darker character arc following the death of his father and his Essos stuff, in particular, really delves into the dark corners of his mind. His father’s cruelty shows itself more than ever and being in his head is almost difficult. In the show, this Essos arc is effectively deleted. Tyrion never meets Young Griff, never meets Illyrio, spends much less time wallowing in the darkness, and actually meets Daenerys pretty dang quickly. And, considering the fact that we’re not in his head, we’re not really exposed to any of his thoughts. It’s left to us to decide how he feels about the situation based on Peter Dinklage’s acting.

But the most contested aspect of Tyrion’s character is his relationship with Sansa and how he treats her throughout the books vs the show. In the books, Tyrion  thinks often about how he is attracted to her. Honestly, it’s uncomfortable at many points, considering that Sansa is like...twelve. And he straight up molests her. He doesn’t rape her on their wedding night, but I don’t think we would call him person of the year for that. He sees an opportunity in being married to her and he’s not completely repulsed by the idea.

In the show, it’s a very different story. Tyrion protects Sansa from Joffrey before their engagement (and even from the Hound in a deleted scene), and his kindness to her does not seem to be motivated in any way by attraction. When he is engaged to her, he is very clearly repulsed, and it is painted much more like him being forced into it. He does not make any physical advances on her and in his scenes with Shae, he makes clear that he sees her as a child and is therefore not interested. Again, because we are not in his head, he are able to interpret this at face value if we prefer. That he isn’t attracted to her and is only doing this to satisfy his father.

At the wedding, he prevents the bedding and, while making a few very crude comments in order to play off threatening the king, does not touch Sansa. Does not even let her undress all the way before he says that they don’t have to do this. And he really doesn’t seem all that bitter about it. Because we don’t have access to his thoughts, we never hear him lamenting that his child bride will never want him.

All of Tyrion’s interactions with Sansa on the show, especially after their marriage, are that of someone trying to make a girl’s life slightly more tolerable even though she is a prisoner. He sympathizes with her and is genuinely horrified by her situation. And he never makes a move even once or complains about it. Because she’s a child. It’s easy for show only watchers to come out of watching this relationship with the opinion of: yeah. Tyrion’s a decent guy. Even though it would be expected and accepted in this society for him to press Sansa, he doesn’t, and that’s cool of him. I’m in NO WAY saying that this means Sansa owes him anything. He’s a Lannister and the Lannisters destroyed her family and if she doesn’t want him, she doesn’t want him. End of story. But Tyrion is, overall, a more sympathetic and better person for how he is portrayed in the show. And you can’t blame show only watchers for seeing him in that way.

Of course this is a double edged sword. In the books, it seems that Tyrion is headed toward some sort of dark/tragic end, and his darker personality earns this. But if the show wants to give him the same ending it might seem very jarring. Because the show has not earned making Tyrion a villain. It has not given him an arc that makes that narratively satisfying because of the white washing. Now maybe Tyrion will get a perfectly find ending or at least remain as a hero. It’s possible that he could have some sort of redemption in the books as well. But we’ll have to wait until season 8 to see how that ends up.

There are a lot of characters that have diverged from their show counterparts. Lena Heady has imbued Cersei Lannister with some very genuinely sympathetic moments and the pathos she brings to her role has moved me on multiple occasions. She also plays Cersei as more in control than she seems in the books, very much her father’s daughter. The book, again, has Cersei’s thoughts and we get a view into her increasingly unstable and paranoid brain. The two characters feel very seperate from each other so conversations and interpretations may vary depend on the version.

The whole ‘lack of thoughts’ thing also makes Jaime easier to stomach in the show. Many of his thoughts are shocking and kind of vile in the books. Nikolaj gives Jaime more pathos and softens him. Again, maybe it’s moral white washing, but you cannot blame a show only watcher for that (like me, who fell in love with Jaime long before I even touched the books). I know people like that Jaime got away from Cersei in the books but that was much more motivated by his own jealousy as opposed to any moral problems he has with her actions, and abandoning her to suffer at the hands of the high sparrow always left a sort of sour taste in my mouth. And I say this as a JaimexBrienne shipper, which I’ll talk about later on. But first--

The Greying of Daenerys

@rainhadaenerys made a pretty extensive post on the differences between show and book Dany which I’ll link here . It’s highly show critical so bear that in mind, but one of the things she mentions is that Daenerys is consistently made more impulsive, less competent and ‘greyer’ as a character. There is a more of a sense, especially in season seven, that she must be ‘controlled’ by her advisors and she rarely makes plans of her own but rather listens to other make plans and decides based off of that. Lots of valid points made in this post.

But if we were to interpret the show only and look at Daenerys as a character seperate from her very different book counterpart, it begins to make sense why the dark dany theory became so popular, especially after season seven. I’m not going to argue my stance on that theory here, but suffice it to say there are a lot of show!dany characteristics that COULD potentially lend themselves to a tragic fall from grace. Though you could make the argument that this is just a writing error on D&D’s, that does not make the interpretation invalid. One could just as easily argue that yes, the transistion is clumsy but that George will write an even better and more believable fall from grace. Again, not saying it will happen. I know a lot of people on all sides of the debate following. I’m just saying that you can’t blame people for differing interpretations based on the show alone.

Posts like the one linked above are great for thinking about the show in context of what it is adapted from. But in a New Critical reading (which focuses on the text itself), we could analyze the show only to extrapolate that perhaps Daenerys is not going to be the hero everyone expects. It’s equally possible to extrapolate that she will be the hero and I’ve written a post here on the various interpretations of Dany so I won’t go too in to detail on this post. But it’s just another example of a show character needing to stand on their own seperate from the books.

The Inconsistency of Arya

Sometimes an adapted character is different from their book counterpart. And sometimes they are inconsistent in their own adaptation. Such is the case of Arya Stark. She’s one of my favorite characters and despite the butchering of her Braavos arc, I still took a lot out of her stuff there when I first watched it. Watching Arya struggle to hold onto her name and her very identity is quite emotional. For the most part, show! Arya might be a bit different but she’s consistent with herself.

Except for fucking season seven? Arya’s arc with Sansa featured some truly trash dialogue (from both characters but especially Arya). And I have nothing against these characters clashing. Far from it. It makes sense for their to be tension. But it was very bad tension and Arya literally threatening to murder her sister and steal her face was one of the more ‘what’ moments of the show.

I bring this up to say that while it is valid to interpret a character based only on their show version, sometimes there is still bad writing within that version that one has to...deal with. And it’s important for a character to be consistent within it’s story.

There are other examples of this besides Arya’s season seven stuff. The Dorne bullshit, for instance, is the canon show Dorne stuff and all of the intriguing Dorne stuff in the book is irrelevant to a show interpretation.

And then there was that trashy season four scene where the directors UNKNOWINGLY filmed Jaime raping Cersei?? That was especially out of character for show Jaime and apparently the show runners thought so too because they didn’t even think they were filming a rape scene. Because they’re dumb sometimes.

Anyway, this is just in here to assure you that I’m not forbidding ‘the show has bad writing’ criticisms because it super does. But sometimes you don’t even need to compare it to the book to see that.

In Conclusion

We are ALL going to view media in different way. There is no right way to consume it. And certainly if you want to evaluate the show based on what happened in the books go right ahead. I’m not here to force anyone to read the show or the books in a certain way.

On the other hand, in some way, the show and books are seperate entities that must function on their own. And because they are so different in some ways, that makes for more differing opinions. Some people really like Tyrion because of his show verse self. Some people wonder if Daenerys will go dark based on her show self.

Me personally, I’m a big Jaime and Brienne shipper. The other day I saw someone who didn’t like their ship mention the power imbalance and age gap in the book--something I of course didn’t notice during the show because the two characters seemed close in age and on pretty equal footing with each other most of the time. And that person’s opinion is totally valid! We’re just both viewing the pairing through a different medium.

This got a little long and rambly, so I just want to throw out there that this not anti any particular character. Just another one of those, it’s okay to have differing opinions and biases and stuff. Enjoy your Game of Thrones, nerds! I’ll be right there along with you!

[hazelgfan]

Game of Thrones and Shipping

I’m not a die-hard romantic, but I’ve always – in one way or another – shipped a couple on almost any TV show or book that I’ve read. Game of Thrones is probably the only show where I’ve never shipped anyone with each other (the notable exception being Jaime and Brienne but I never truly believed they would happen, so for me they don’t really count).

So, it came as somewhat of a surprise, when, somewhere during season 7, I picked up on the fact that there are people who are zealous Jon and Dany shippers. Of course, people are allowed to ship what they want (no question there), but it made me think on why I never shipped them, as they are somewhat of an obvious choice. It was very curious to me that I never saw these two together. Like, here you have two heroes who try to make the world a better place – together they’d be “difficult to defeat” as everyone’s little darling Littlefinger put it.

The thing is, even though I started unconsciously shipping Jon with Sansa since season 6, I NEVER intended to ship anyone on this show. This isn’t a show where you can easily ship two people. Almost all the romances portrayed either served the story progression in some way, ended up tragically and/or simply didn’t fit the normal expectations for romance of a modern audience.

I will try to illustrate my point with three prominent couples on the show/in the books who ended tragically, but who either served the plot and character development or didn’t portray a typical romance story.

Tyrion/Shae: Let’s be upfront about this – this relationship was way more romanticised in the shows than in the books. George R.R. Martin seems much more gritty, much more realistic if you will. This isn’t “Pretty Woman”, where the rich man falls in love with the whore and they live happily ever after. As such, them obviously caring so deeply for each other on the show was a little bit of an idealization but I for one didn’t mind. After all people of very different backgrounds fall in love and care for each other deeply all the time. However, even though their relationship was romanticised, the real problems connected with it never disappeared. Tyrion wanted Shae as his mistress since he couldn’t marry her and wouldn’t run away with her as she proposed several times. When she didn’t relent he tried to send her away, ultimately ending their relationship in betrayal and death. I repeat: These people loved each other yet still betrayed one other. Here is a prime example of a tragical love story.

Robb/Talisa: I really loved this couple. I loved watching them fall in love and get married, loved their interactions and their chemistry. I liked Talisa’s backstory and how they each made the other so much happier than before. I didn’t ship them though, I just enjoyed their romance and relationship unfold on screen. But even with that going on, as a viewer you always had the feeling that their relationship would cause problems down the line because the viewers knew of Robb’s promise to Walder Frey before he ever met Talisa. So their romance was not a romance in the sense you get in romantic comedies: It served the purpose of showing that actions have consequences. It was a major point of character development for Robb who chose love over duty (some would say honor) and ultimately paid the price for it. In a happier world you could expect that him rejecting the Frey girl for his one true love would end in happily ever after. Not on this show though, not in George R.R. Martin’s books. And as much as I still grieve for Robb and Talisa and Catelyn, I was also really ‘satisfied’ with how that story was resolved. It showed that your actions have consequences and sometimes even marrying for love can be a bad decision. Their relationship was doomed from the beginning (I’m just glad they had some happy days before they died). Their relationship ultimately served a purpose for the narrative, which changed its course because with Robb’s death, the war of the five kings was effectually over.

Ned/Catelyn: Talk about pragmatism. Engaged to marry Ned’s older brother Brandon since age twelve, Catelyn must marry Ned shortly after Brandon dies. She has never seen him before (I looked this up on Wiki so not sure about the veracity of it). The fact remains, however, that Catelyn had to change her ‘allegiance’ quite quickly. She knew Brandon, knew she was going to be his wife, she probably had developed feelings for the handsome older Stark. And then her whole world is turned upside down and she has to marry the shy, younger brother, someone she doesn’t know at all. It must have been difficult for Ned too, to be a sort of replacement for his more handsome brother. In fact, there is still a bit of bitterness and maybe a little bit of envy in Ned in the books when he talks to Catelyn about his brother. Ned and Catelyn were not a romantic couple – they weren’t in love, the just did what was expected of them. And yet, theirs is the only successful relationship in the books and on the show (I may be overlooking other couples but I’m focused on the “big ones” so bear with me here). Isn’t this telling? The only non-romantic couple, actually starts to care for each other deeply to the point where the other becomes everything for them, even though their relationship was initially not based on love. This beautiful relationship is torn apart tragically with Ned’s death.

(I actually wanted to write something about Jaime/Cersei/Brienne and Gilly/Sam – as well as maybe about Lyanna/Rhaegar – but this is already getting too long, so I may do that at another time).

With these examples, can it really surprise me that I never really wanted to ship anyone on this show? Game of Thrones isn’t about romance and if there is romance, the romance always serves a purpose. Enter Dany and Jon. I never shipped them for several reasons and this was before I knew they were related:

1. It is very cliché to have the hero and heroine (I believe Dany is more of tragical hero and others have written very convincing metas about this) get together and if Game of Thrones/ASOIAF is anything, then not cliché.

2. Dany falling in love/marrying Jon and maybe having a child with him really retracts from her character. She is ‘Mhysa’, the mother of the common people and of dragons (of course the Mhysa thing has been rightly criticized as well), she is a saviour to them, she is a conqueror, and she is going down a dark route (seriously this started way back in season 2, although I didn’t notice it at the time, when Dany threatens the Quarteen with destroying them and all who have wronged her just because they refuse her to enter their city).

3. Jon’s story arc, I feel, would be “swallowed” by Dany if they truly start a romance. Dany is larger than life. I don’t see her ever accepting anyone as truly equal. That’s Dany’s tragedy in a way. She is all alone because she won’t let anyone share the pedestal she has put herself on.

4. After the reveal: (And this has nothing to do with the narrative but is solely personal so doesn’t really count): They are Aunt and Nephew. It’s weird and icky.

 Now, the show clearly has gone down that road, as exemplified by boatbang. But the more interesting question here is: Where will they go from now on? (sidenote: The “Where will we go?” quote from Jon is the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard and he says it to Sansa – that’s very telling!).

Based on what I’ve outline before – namely that romance always serves a purpose in the narrative and/or ends tragically – can anyone truly believe that Jon and Dany’s relationship will end happily? If they would, then the narrative wouldn’t have set up Jon as the ‘true’ heir to the Iron Throne. This revelation is going to plunge both Jon and Dany into serious despair. Dany, who has done everything for her goal to be Queen of Westeros, who justifies her war only through her claim, is up for a serious downfall. Jon, whose whole story arc is about identity, will go down a darker route too (his story after the revelation is a little bit harder to foretell, though). And all of this will happen against the backdrop of a WW invasion. With all of this going on, their relationship is doomed, as was Robb and Talisa’s, as was Tyrion and Shae’s. I can see the need for them to have sex before all is revealed because it makes the stakes so much higher. That doesn’t mean I like it. If I had my way, they would have found out who they are and Dany would have found the family she’s craving with Jon and the Starks – I would not have them be attracted to each other. But, alas, that would make a more boring story, so of course, that’s not going to happen on Game of Thrones.

The way the Jon/Dany thing was written in season 7 didn’t struck me as particularly romantic. They still ended up in bed together, but we have to ask ourselves: What is the purpose here? Anyone who has seen their sex scene with Bran’s voice narrating Jon’s true parentage playing in the background cannot expect their relationship to end on a happy note. This is buildup for tragedy if I’ve ever seen one, particularly for Dany. Why would the writers decide to do that, other than to push her over the edge? Personally, I don’t mind Dany going down the dark route. I think it makes for very interesting television and I believe she will turn around at the end. Maybe then she can become the true saviour that she always wanted to be.