#not to push both my anti targaryen AND alys/alaric agendas at 9am on a thursday

[patrocles]

What did you think about the show confirming that the targs conquered the 7K to prepare Westeros for the long night

So I'm kinda back and forth on this. When Viserys told Rhaenyra in the first episode I just burst out laughing like??? It almost feels jarring that after years of GOT not caring about prophecies and certainly not the BIG one, it feels weird to include it now especially since Arya killed the Night King anyways??? (But tbh I don't consider that ~~canon~~ anyways, so maybe the real long night will be the Jon Snow series?) I DIGRESS.

There's a lot to consider, so here's kinda where my brain is at:

If Aegon knew about the Long Night, and used that as an excuse to conquer Westeros, that doesn't make him a Good Guy. There's this idea that before the Targaryens, the Westerosi kingdoms were nothing more than a fumbling band of hill tribes that he and his sisters had to unite. But you could argue that it was precisely Targaryen presence that halted progression in the country. If anything, I think knowing about this apocalyptic-level threat and not really telling anyone about it (except your heir?) and using that as a secret justification to do the mass-murder conquering he wanted to do anyways makes Aegon even eviler than he already was. Because what did destroying Dorne or the Field of Fire have to do with helping save Westeros?

But I think that's also precisely what makes the Targaryens such a flawed and goofy-ass dynasty? We know from literally every other character that's had a prophetic dream that they're often vague and easy to misinterpret. And characters will often interpret them in a way that they want to. So there's no way of knowing that Aegon even interpreted his own dream correctly. But it is EXTREMELY within the Targaryen nature to center themselves regardless; What Viserys tells Rhaenyra in ep1 is basically "Aegon had this dream of a world-ending apocalypse and it can only be stopped if we're on the throne" and what's inscribed on the catspaw blade in ep4 are TOTALLY different.

I think the way it was interpreted was more about ensuring that someone of his bloodline was The Last Hero, but not about protecting Westeros. Because if he truly knew about this Grade-A level threat... why not at least share it with the Starks who've had a longer history with the Others and have been benefactors of The Wall for THOUSANDS of years longer? Why not come together like "Hey, you have this knowledge, I just had this crazy dream, lets share what we both know to come up with something that will benefit us all in the long-run." But he didn't do that? And none of the subsequent Targaryen kings did that, short of just pissing the Starks off like Ole King Joe. Only Queen Alysanne made it a priority to reach out to the Starks and try and build some kind of relationship. (Hell maybe Silverwing did leave some eggs in Winterfell as a failsafe in case something happened to the Targaryens in the future, and maybe Alyssa was actually Alaric Stark's to make sure there was someone in the bloodline with Ice and Fire ((this was a crack theory until i realized she's the only one of Joe and Alys' kids without silver hair and had some particular Stark traits in looks and temperament and her birth was right after Alysannes progress north))

But either way, I don't think all the Targaryens kings after Rhaenyra knew about it, as it seems like it was lost at some point and rediscovered by Rhaegar as a child. It actually gets really messy when you then think about Aegon IV and Summerhall, and the alleged Maester conspiracy that they helped kill dragons and their ALLEGED conspiracy to get the Targaryens off the throne? It just feels like there had to have been a better system of making sure that there was a failsafe in place beyond just a game of telephone and a knife. But I don't think that's a narrative or writing flaw, but just further proof that the Targaryens are kinda Not Good At This Whole Ruling Thing if they can't even handle something as serious as this.