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esther-dot · 2 years ago

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We should talk more about the fandom's love of violence as a response to the injustice.

Bcs i think they're (english isn't mother lenguaje 😅) being played by Grrm? He knows we like to escape to fantasy worlds and seeing the evil be defeated, but also he knows of our taste for blood, vengeance and retaliation.

I know what he said about he not being a strict pacifist believer. But is still contradicts his beliefs to burn alive someone for example, crucify a bunch of people, torture of innocent girls, or torture, simple torture.

One of the mayor problems of Grrm is the ethics and morals of his readers(and his).

Oh, I certainly agree that our acceptance of casual violence as a culture (I say this as an American, perhaps it is different elsewhere), has made a lot of fans miss how critical he is of violence in all forms. There’s a disconnect between what we believe the solution is (killing) and how he shows that to be ineffective. As in, Aerys starts killing people in an unjustified way which leads to a justified rebellion, but in that rebellion, innocents die (Elia, her children) and characters like Ned and Robert, who are victors, have their relationships changed, change as people, never recover what they lost--themselves or their loved ones. It's not a happy ending, not merely because both of those men die by the end of the first book, but because we also know that Aerys’ daughter is coming for revenge and will unleash devastation on Westeros in her effort to reclaim it.

Or we can look at Joffrey killing Ned (unjust), the North going to war (totally understandable), but we’re shown how the smallfolk suffer, that it doesn’t save the Starks from further suffering, and Robb and Cat die. Even when wars seem justified or necessary, Martin refuses to glamorize them the way the fandom wants and might expect. I’ve said before, depicting something isn’t condoning it, and we all land in very different places on certain subjects, “is this for a purpose or is this revealing a disturbing thing about the author”? But justice, mercy, war, peace…that all seems to have been of great interest to him from the get go which means we as readers should try to listen very carefully for that authorial guidance when determining what he is saying about it. Ned chose to save Jon (commit treason), he was ready to defy Robert over Dany, he warned Cersei in an attempt to save her children, and I think fro all his mistakes elsewhere, in these moments, we were meant to see that his was the moral choice:

What strange fit of madness led you to tell the queen that you had learned the truth of Joffrey's birth?" "The madness of mercy," Ned admitted. (AGOT, Eddard XV)

I understand how we get swept up in that feeling of power when a hero can easily kill the bad guy and guarantee a happy ending, but that isn't Martin's world, and in fact, he used Ned to show us how much he valued mercy instead. I recently watched The Last Kingdom: Seven Kings Must Die and Uhtred told someone that if you kill a man it only means three sons will rise up to kill you. It made me think of Ned's death, his children who want to kill Lannisters, of the North's loyalty to him, the reality of Dany returning, there is a cost to violence in Martin's story. Obviously, the good guys kill, you're right, he doesn't create a way to be a complete pacifist, and yet, I do think there may be a misalignment between his generation of hippies and our own which is also anti war but otherwise...shall I say, a little more open to violent means.

If we look at Ned's answer to a potential problem (whether that was Jon being a Targ who might grow to hate "the usurpers" for what they took from him a la Dany, or Jon being a bastard who might resent his trueborn "siblings"), he thought love would save them. That Jon growing up loving and being loved by his children would be the solution to a potential future problem. I've said before, I believe Jon will help in retaking Winterfell, will protect Ned's children when he failed to, because Ned, even if he is naive and people suffered for it, had the right ideals.

I believe this is why Sansa is so important because she has that ability to care and show mercy for enemies of her house and people who wrong her specifically, so it seems to me, that she would be someone who might strike compromises for peace rather than resort to further violence. War, death, that doesn’t seem to be Martin's preferred solution, and certainly, cruel deaths, torture, slavery, none of that is acceptable to him which feels like a silly thing to point out, but it is of course, an unpopular stance in the fandom, nonetheless true, and one we should keep discussing! I quite frequently see people act like those of us who write “anti Daenerys” (a tag we use out of consideration for her fans, a consideration that anti Sansa people have never given us) content are engaging in a ship war, but if one wants to understand what the author is saying, I don’t think you can avoid it? Is it really more reasonable to conclude Martin wants us to be fine with burning a slave alive than that we’re meant to be horrified? Tbh, if he didn’t want us to condemn it, doesn’t that demand we condemn his moral framework? It’s a different kind of fandom engagement, perhaps, but trying to understand what the author is saying is the basic form of engagement with a novel, shouldn’t be as offensive as people pretend.

I say this a lot but I always want to reiterate, I love that people who speak English as a second language still engage with the fandom. I know that English speakers are spoiled with content and ease of engagement, and that it can be intimidating to reach out for anyone, more so if there's anxiety about the language barrier, but I'm very happy you did it anyway, and hope you know how much I admire you for it!

#dot chat

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from-sunset-sea-and-sorrow · 6 months ago

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I honestly think that the inability to understand the most basic ideas of ASOIAF characters comes from bad faith criticism, especially if they think that "long winter" is not a central plot point of the story.

Whatever about worldbuilding, I don't care about the freaking bees of Westeros (and the problem is again that Martin has a stick up his ass and should act more like Tolkien and embrace more the poetry and less the pedantry).

I understand and enjoy criticism (1- I think he deserves it, 2- I like to interact with different opinions of things I read/watch/whatever) but saying "winter is unimportant" explains why so many understand the books as a misanthrope story.

Because you have Jaime's journey after "being evil" or Sansa learning the game of thrones to survive while knowing that she doesn't want to become a Cersei.

There's a lot of dark and cruelty but the central conclusion is always the same: be clever!

That's where the TV show failed, in the book consequences matter!

Ned is not dead because he was "good", Ned is dead because he was DUMB!

Nobody said "oh but why did he have to die?" because we know why!

Every single death happens because someone didn't know how to play the game.

That's why Daenerys is doomed to become a fascist (the tv show was BAD but the general idea of Dany turning "bad" is there in the books too).

That's why I will always defend Sansa (arguably the biggest victim of fan's misogyny).

The characters, good or bad, are (usually) incredibly well written, with (usually) a lot of nuance.

From the anti chosen one/Prince Charming of Dany/Jon to the child soldier metaphors of Arya there's really a lot of though and care behind them all. And that's why the books have become impossible to finish. Too many complex pieces to play with.

Martin has A LOT to criticize and I wish he stopped with the bullshit (and the obsession with rape, and the racism, and the...) but I can't understand how someone can read those books and think "this author thinks humans are awful".

Everyone hates Cersei and then Martin goes "Take this, a Cersei POV chapter" and... Fuck.

Yes, she's bad. But suddenly she is a person, not a fairy tale evil queen. She has ambition, she's scared, she's a mother, she's a woman in a sexist world full of violence against women... And we learn all those fears and dreams directly from her, from the "evil queen".

One of the little things that the TV show did well was Joffrey's death.

I remember people being... Uncomfortable. Because while enjoying the death of a monster they realized "wow... He's just a 16 year old boy... Dying in his mother's arms..."

And that, and not "historical accuracy" or whatever Martin claims, is the true golden heart of ASOIAF.

That the world is awful and make us awful

And that it doesn't have to be like that.

That's why the winter IS central.

Because a looming doom should be enough to make them realize how dumb the whole "game of thrones" is (like, you know...the real world and climate change??? The pandemic and the totally insufficient collaboration between countries???) and yet they keep fighting for an ugly chair that kills you if you sit on it too hard because it's made out of the swords of a colonialist war.

IT'S NOT SUBTLE

For all its faults, what ASOIAF is saying (or should be if Martin stopped with the bullshit) is that the world is awful, but you don't have to, and that it's never too late to change.

That you can be good but you have to be CLEVER.

That the kids are the future and can be the change.

That the Starks were always right and the winter is coming.

And that the lone wolf dies but the pack survives.

And I don't think he's ever gonna finish the books, but I don't think it's a coincidence that the last book is called "A promise of Spring".

Say what you want about Martin and his stupidity and empty pride.

But ASOIAF, even if failing a lot in achieving it, is ultimately about hope.

Hope in spite of horror.

Btw, a disclaimer: I'm not even a fan anymore!

I haven't even read the last published book!

But to be a hater you have to admit the good parts too!

Listen to Orson Welles, the OG hater!

Jeez!

Disclaimer x2: I refuse to acknowledge any grammar or orthographic mistake, I can't read anymore 😌

Someone over on Discord asked, "I'm morbidly curious: How BAD is A Song of Ice and Fire in terms of the authenticity George claims it to be?"

My reply was straightforward:

The long and the short of it is that ASOIAF is basically a vehicle for GRRM to present both his rape fetish and his Hobbesian view on human nature and has less historical accuracy than Frozen or most other Disney movies.

That's actually a good way to think of it, now that I've said it--he's Family Unfriendly, they're Family Friendly, but both have the same relationship with History: just Pure Aesthetic with no consideration for how the worldbuilding would work.

#long post #asoiaf #books #to be a hater you have to appreciate the good parts too #I won't allow empty haterism #yeez!#I don't know why I'm even defending this books I think I'm bored and it's late #read Discworld if you want more fairy tale deconstruction and nuanced characters without the grimdark #read Discworld as a basic advice #and even if you don't like ASOIAF its characters are amazingly constructed so theres always something to learn #even from the things we hate

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shieldofrohan · 3 years ago

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I say it again... if you keep giving the villains' side to the readers, they will be more interested with THEM and THEIR FEELINGS and THEIR STORIES (no one cares about Bran because he has like 20 povs in 5 books).

This is such a great point 👏 . From what I have seen in the fandom , people are just not invested in Bran's character . Once in a while you get to see an analysis on his character and that too in Tumblr whereas it's just not present in other forums . D&D are to be blamed for the way they took him out of a season and then later just wheeled him around before crowning king . But the thing is as you said even in the books , Grrm hasn't done enough work with him considering he is the fantasy protagonist and the endgame emperor .

One of my favourite character in the series is Jaime and in the fandom he is also someone people are invested in and it's interesting to see how much material we get to see of him after he is given POV status . As you said , giving more page time means that the readers will be invested in their character's arc regardless of whether they like them or hate them . Just in 2 books his chapters closely number to Bran's in five books .

Hello Anon,

Previous ask: XX

Other asks about this: XY , XZ

If Sansa and Bran weren't main characters then I would understand author's choice of giving fewer chapters to them but they are the MOST IMPORTANT ones according to his ending.

Like I said before Martin is (fortunately and unfortunately) too obsessed with gray characters. Because he can go both ways in extrem measure with them. They can do sth really fcked up but also can do sth really heroic. Believe me if Jon wasn't at Wall he wouldn't have these many chapters. Because Jon is not that grey like Tyrion, Jaime, Daenerys, Arya... He is lucky that he is the only POV from Wall.

In AGOT, we have Arya, Ned and Sansa in KL and do you know which Stark girl had the more chapters? SANSA. I know... shocking but also tells a lot (btw she has only ONE chapter more than Arya- Sansa: 6, Arya:5) because KL was Sansa's story not Arya's. Bran had even more (7) because he was truly a main character back then (Jon had 9 btw) with him seeing Jaime/Cersei, finding wolves, coma dreams etc

AGOT:

Jon: 9

Bran: 7

Sansa: 6

Arya: 5

In ACOK... things change a little..

Arya: 10

Jon and Sansa: 8

Bran: 7

Gonna pretend Arya's chapters were necessary (she didn't need more than 8 if you ask me...)

ASOS:

Arya: 13

Jon: 12

Sansa: 7

Bran: 4

(I understand people thought Bran was dead but come on... and 13 for Arya is just absurd and ASOS was Sansa's book for real... but then again hiding her POV was necessary for keeping Tyrion in the dark I guess... whatever)

AFFC:

Sansa: 3

Arya: 3

(why? Also lots of new povs)

ADWD:

Jon: 13

Bran: 3

Arya: 2

(why the fck she was in AFFC too then?)

AFFC and ADWD were supposed to be one book so:

Jon: 13

Arya: 5

Sansa: 3

Bran: 3

(lol even Arya suffered because of the new POVs)

Jon, Tyrion and Daenerys are the most popular trio for a reason as you can see. Even after the new POVs, they didn't suffer much...

ADWD:

Jon: 13

Tyrion: 12

Daenerys: 10

This is why people believe that these three are the ThreE HeadS Of thE gEcKo...

And Arya follows them behind because in total (minus TWOW):

Tyrion: 47

Jon: 42

Arya: 33

Daenerys: 31

OUR FUTURE KING AND QUEEN MEANWHILE:

Sansa: 24

Bran: 21

Tyrion is in the middle of every fcking thing and Martin loves writing his man-pain so he has the most chapters.

Jon has his own arc and he is the only pov of that storyline.

Daenerys also has her own story (I think Dany should have had more than Jon ngl).

Arya ??? IDK. Martin loves writing her. Her having more chapters than Dany is just stupid.

Sansa suffers in ACOK and ASOS because of Tyrion (oh the irony) and Bran suffers in ASOS because... idk- he is hiding etc.

I think the problem is that Bran has a very limited storyline. He has one purpose and very few people around him. And Grrm can't go too further with his visions because of spoilers. Still his story is more interesting than Arya's. It is funny that Arya is the real CaMeRa most of the time but whatever... we should keep pretending that her too many povs were necessary (there was no way for Grrm to cut things out you know... they were all necessary).

ANYWAY... Can Grrm mend this mess? Realistically: maybe?

ALIVE POVs:

ARYA

SANSA

JON

TYRION

BRAN

DAENERYS

JAIME

CERSEI

AERON

BARRISTAN

JONCON

ARIANNE

THEON

ASHA

MELISANDRE

DAVOS

SAMWELL

VICTARION

BRIENNE

AREO HOTAH

ESSOS:

Arya (Braavos)

Tyrion, Barristan, Victarion, Daenerys (Meereen, Dothraki Sea)

WESTEROS:

STORMLANDS: JonCon, Arianne

KING'S LANDING: Cersei

REACH: Samwell, Aeron

DORNE: Areo

RIVERLANDS: Jaime, Brienne

VALE: Sansa

NORTH: Davos, Theon, Asha

WALL: Jon, Melisandre

BEYOND WALL: Bran

THE MAP:

I made this map to see the last locations of POV characters (might be wrong so let me know). And according to this map, some POVs can be cut. For example:

Asha will tell Theon's story too -> fewer Theon POVs. And also we'll read about Stannis' North story via these two characters. And we'll hear about Ramsay too.

Brienne and Jaime are in the same place in Riverlands right now -> My guess: Brienne POV will be cut to keep Jaime in dark till meeting with Stoneheart.

Jon and Melisandre are at Wall and he is dead.. lol -> so Mel will cover for Wall story: Others, Watch, Wildlings

JonCon and Arianne are both in Stormlands and they are about to meet -> more Arianne POV is my guess. We'll see the foundation of Martell/Aegon alliance

Aeron and Sam are in Reach -> My guess: we'll read the aftermath of Euron's antics via Sam

Barristan is in Meereen, Tyrion is near Meereen, Victarion is on Meereen's Bay. -> I think we'll read the Battle of Fire from all of them. And after Daenerys returns from Dothraki Sea (Vaes Dothrak) with the ultimate Khalaasar her POVs will suffer because of Tyrion and others. And this will also help to author to keep Dany's established FireAndBlood persona in subtext.

Lonely POVS and my predictions (time to bullish*t folks):

Arya in Braavos -> No idea don't care... but my guess: I think we might read the Red Wedding 2.0 and Nymeria's pack's contribution via her (warging). She'll be in trouble with Faceless Men probably and she'll need to leave Braavos. I think she might come to Riverlands because her story is really intertwine with Stoneheart I feel like she should face the reality of pursuing revenge. After that she'll probably head North.

Areo in Dorne -> If I am not wrong he is after Darkstar with Obara and Ser Balon Swann. We might hear about Doran's plans via him but other than that I am not sure.

Cersei in King's Landing -> Kevan is dead, Jaime is not coming and there is no one to stop her. She is gonna blow up the sept, the death of Margaery, the alliance with Tyrells end... We might read about Aegon taking KL via her.

Sansa in Vale: Shadrich or sth else happens, she'll travel North with Brienne imo. She'll meet Jon at Wall and reunite with Jeyne Poole

Davos in White Harbor -> He will go Skagos to find Rickon. And after that he'll probably sail for Wall and after his arrival I feel like Mel, Selyse and Shireen will join Stannis because we know that he'll burn Shireen and we'll read these via Mel.

Bran: Some visions, warging, Bloodraven, sth sth sth, Hodor dies and they'll go back South.

TWOW and ADOS will have prologue and epilogue POVs.

We know that TWOW prologue will have Jeyne Westerling. So the book will start with Jeyne and others' journey to Crag (Westerlands). Nothing good will happen...

I really can't imagine the other prologue and epilogues. Sorry.

But there are some plots that is set to happen so make your own guesses for these:

Myrcella and Nymeria Sand and I think Trysten Martell will go KL and Cersei was planning an attack to kill Trysten on the way but she'll frame it like Tyrion did it (Doran knows this plan). It would be tragic if Myrcella dies during this..

Martin kind of said that we'll have a Casterly Rock POV. This could be a prologue/epilogue or maybe Tyrion/Cersei/Jaime in CR.

Red Wedding 2.0

ok... I am done.

So as you can see many POVs will be cut. Martin should use this to give more voice and build up to characters like Sansa and Bran.

WILL HE?? Fck me if I know. Hopefully.

HEY!! I love Jaime too even though he is a jerk, he just makes me laugh and I like his oaths dilemma. And yes look at how fans' approach to him changed when Martin made him a POV character. He is a villain and yet I care about his story because Martin is filling pages with him.

The more chapters he gives to a character more interesting they'll become to the readers. Simple math really.

Occasionally people become fans of very minor characters with sparse content BUT in those cases readers KNOW that these people won't end up as the heroes/protagonists.

So the author makes his statement with chapters numbers and so far Martin's: "Bran is the protagonist" statement doesn't match with his writing choices.

Let me repeat it again: I understand why he is not writing 30 sth Bran chapters. Because he can't reveal too much but while doing this he fails to make readers CARE about Bran. Martin should find a balance. In Sansa's case... he can remedy it more easily in TWOW and ADOS than Bran's case. We'll see. It is all about planning the story and shaping the reaction according to his statements.

Thanks for the ask, have a nice day.

#mine #pov struggle #anon #ask #answered #asoiaf #twow and ados predictions #twow speculation #I am just bullshitting at this point don't mind me #anti arya stans #anti arya stark #just to be safe

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raya-rhaenyra-ahsoka · 4 years ago

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Why Daenerys Should've Stayed Longer in the North Than Attack Cersei Too Soon (Which is a dick move, really) PART 2

This is a continuation from my other post, as promised. Here’s the link to Part 1 here.

ALLIES FROM THE SOUTH

The Stormlands. With Dany recently legitimizing Robert Baratheon’s last living bastard, Gendry (Yay!), and appointed him as the new Lord of Storm’s End, I think he had pledged his loyalty and full support to her.

Now since the Baratheons are the overlords of the Stormlands, it ultimately makes the Stormlands part of Dany’s new rule in Westeros. And if the Stormmen questioned Gendry’s legitimacy, there are two people who can back him up: Ser Davos Seaworth, a landed knight, and Ser Brienne of Tarth, literally the heiress to Evenfall in Tarth Island. Both of whom are from the Stormlands and have served the late Baratheon lords, Stannis,

and Renly, respectively.

TV show-wise, Gendry had taken over Edric Storm’s plotline. Edric Storm was another one of Robert’s many bastards and it was him who Ser Davos saved from being killed by Mellisandre in the books, not Gendry. Gendry himself was grateful to Davos for saving his life and he sort of stepped up as his own parental figure. I also think Gendry reminded Davos of the son he lost during the Battle of Blackwater Bay.

As for Brienne, she and Gendry never shared a conversation in the show, but in the books, he even saved her life. Brienne came from Tarth, an island in the Stormlands, where her father Selwyn Tarth is lord and one of the many bannermen of the Baratheons of Storm’s End. Brienne came across Gendry in the Inn at the Crossroads while she was searching for the Stark girls. When she saw him, she literally thought he was Renly because of his striking resemblance to his uncle. Their exchange went something like this:

Brienne: Oh my god, Lord Renly?!

Gendry: Uh, what? Lord? Lol no, I’m just a smith.

I wished it happened in the show, it would’ve been funny.

Dorne. There isn’t much plot regarding Dorne in the show. (Again, f*ck D&D for ruining a great sub-plot of the story!) But in the books, the Martell heiress, Arianne was the ultimate feminist icon. She supported and fought for Myrcella Baratheon’s claim to the Iron throne over her younger brother, Tommen, and she hoped that the rest of Westeros would follow after Dorne’s right of inheritance regardless of gender and order of birth. But no! They disregarded that seemingly important plot that even George R.R. Martin was disappointed about the changes. (We hear you, George!) Nevertheless, Arianne would’ve supported a queen, yes. But between Daenerys and Cersei, she’d probably go with Dany mainly because of their family ties. In case you forgot, Rhaegar’s late first wife, Elia Martell, was Arianne’s aunt. Also, because of what happened to Elia and Oberyn Martell in King’s Landing, the Martells practically loathed the Lannisters. In the show, Oberyn Martell’s paramour Ellaria Sand, and his bastard daughters, the Sand Snakes, hated the Lannisters, that’s why they sided with Dany. But with all of them dead and House Martell now extinct, I think the new prince of Dorne would’ve allied himself with a tamer ruler, not one who plays with wildfire. (Note: this is when Dany stayed in the North and did not march south yet.)

Spies. In the Art of War, the use of spies implies gaining knowledge of the enemy, knowing their motive and their next move. With Lord Varys the Spider in Winterfell, who’s still serving under Daenerys, has its advantages. Vary’s networks of spies or as what he called them, his “little birds” are literally scattered across the seven kingdoms.

His little birds are actually children, and appearance-wise, cannot be easily identified as spies. With his intel, they could easily formulate a plan to defeat Cersei.

DEFENSE AT SEA

If Cersei couldn’t do it by land, she’ll go by sea. Which, Daenerys of course, have the appropriate fleets to defend, covering both the Narrow and Sunset Seas. Here's a map:

(Source: pinterest.com)

Enemies to the East. If Cersei will be stupid enough to attack through the Narrow Sea by sea, Daenerys has the fleets to defend. The Northern fleet, a.k.a the Manderly Fleet of White Harbor and the Arryn Fleet in Gulltown in the Vale will join forces.

Enemies to the West. And if they invade through the Sunset Sea, they’d have to pass the Iron Islands, where Yara Greyjoy’s Fleet will intercept them, with the help of the Mallister Fleet in Seagard.

Who would win depends. The only other person that’s probably as good as Euron at sea is his niece, Yara. The rest of Dany’s fleet would have to get lucky or outnumber the number of ships in a fleet.

At this point, you’ll probably be like, oh, what if they steer clear from the fleets and enter the North’s weakly defended areas? Okay, that job falls to the castles nearest to their borders. The northernmost castle is the Last Hearth, the seat of House Umber, which is practically already deserted. On the south is Greywater Watch, which has the strongest defense out of all four cardinal directions. On both east and west hold the seat of two branches of House Flint, with Widow’s Watch on the east, and Flint’s Finger on the west (Again, refer to the map above). Once they see Cersei’s fleet, they’ll inform the people in Winterfell.

People tend to forget that Daenerys has the only air support with her dragons. So when she hears about this, she’ll easily burn the enemy fleet with one dracarys away.

That is, if Qyburn hadn’t installed that big-ass crossbow in one of the ships, then she’ll have to be better at dodging them. It gets better if Jon’s willing to help her with Rhaegal, but we’ll never know.

OUTNUMBERED AND SURROUNDED

The map shows the Crownlands and its neighboring kingdoms of the Vale, the Riverlands, the Reach, and the Stormlands. (Source: pinterest.com)

Territories. With Cersei sacrificing Casterly Rock to tighten her grip on the Iron Throne, she technically had also sacrificed the Westerlands, which meant everything north of King’s Landing is Dany’s territory now. With Dany’s army and territories secured, the Crownlands, where King’s Landing is, is technically surrounded by the Vale, the Riverlands, the Reach, and Stormlands. I included the Reach because, well, she roasted the Tarlys and took the remaining men to her cause with a choice, bend the knee or die in a blaze of glory.

Armies. Dany has the combined armies of North, Vale, Riverlands, Westerlands, Reach, Stormlands, and maybe Dorne, plus, the Unsullied; fleets of the North, Vale, Riverlands, and Yara’s fleet from the Iron Islands; and the only air support, her two remaining dragons. Cersei on the other hand, just had the army of the Crownlands, King’s Landing’s City Watch, the queensguard, plus, the Golden Company without elephants; and Euron Greyjoy’s fleet.

I think it’s obvious that Dany outnumbers Cersei’s army, by a lot. And at this point, Dany has enough allies to lay a siege on King’s Landing.

DAENERYS VS. CERSEI

Let’s discuss the difference in the personalities and motives of Daenerys Targaryen and Cersei Lannister.

They both have blond hair, are the only girl among three siblings, and are queens in their own right. But that’s where their similarities end.

Cersei currently sits on the iron throne, and she is loving the perks that came with it. Endless Power, which meant she can do whatever she wants and not care about what people think, like sleeping with her brother. With the news of Dany coming back to Westeros, she sees her as a threat and wanted nothing more than for Dany to disappear so she could stay in power.

Daenerys, however, claims that being the queen of the seven kingdoms is her birthright, as it was the Targaryens that reunited the whole continent of Westeros. Of course, it’s still power, but at the same time, she sees it as a responsibility as well. (With great power, comes great responsibility. Wow, I’m quoting Spiderman now.) She believes that as a queen, it’s her job to take care and provide for the needs of her subjects and even makes an effort to hold court as she listened to their demands. She also thinks that slavery is a big no-no, so she freed them.

The key to becoming a great leader is finding the balance between being loved and feared by your subjects. Cersei is more likely feared than loved. She also doesn’t care about her people, a fact that she admitted to her brother, Tyrion once. Daenerys most likely had the scale tips on balance, with her being equally loved and feared by her subjects. She’s loved because she actually takes time to listen to the people’s needs, and feared because she could take you out using her dragons with one word.

If Dany did lay siege on King’s Landing (again, we aren’t counting her major mad queen moment), the only thing Cersei can use against Dany is the people living within the city walls. Cersei might have heard that Dany’s been freeing slaves in the cities surrounding Slaver’s Bay, and figured out that she has a soft spot for the common folk.

In conclusion, if Daenerys had simply waited out and took her time planning and gathering allies and supplies against Cersei, she would’ve been successful in her campaign to retake Westeros. But then again, we aren’t the writers for this show. In the end, they had Jon battling through himself while he chooses to reply with either of his two favorite lines, She’s my queen or I don’t want it. Or that Sansa and Arya doesn’t like Dany at all and think that she’s a power-hungry, dragon-riding bitch. Or that Bran doesn’t give a f*ck about anything. So, yeah. What do you guys think?

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weirwoodking · 4 years ago

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I hope you don't mind this question: but what are some things you hate about Show!Dany? I also hate her in the show because...well that simply isn't Dany to me

y’know, I was gonna write a long response to this... but I just don’t feel up to it. It would be simpler if you just came over to my house and watched GOT with me as I pause every two seconds to explain what’s wrong. I’ll just leave you with this instead:

George R.R. Martin’s Daenerys Stormborn in Qarth:

HBO’s “Dragon Lady” in Qarth:

Oh, here’s a line that was going to be part of my longer response: HBO’s Daenerys Targaryen was a character specifically crafted to appeal to male viewers who just wanted to look at a sexualized actress and to female viewers who have the incessant need to shout “slay queen!” at any female protagonist they see. Daenerys Targaryen from A Song of Ice and Fire is one of the most iconic female characters in all of fantasy literature, and I will be forever heartbroken by how she is now going to be remembered by the general public as “girlboss dragon queen who was done dirty in the last season.” No, she was done dirty since the beginning. They were always trying to portray her as “crazy and evil”, you were just too blinded by the girlboss filter to notice.

#okay no more anti-got stuff it drains me so much #a million long metas have been written on this #ask #anon

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ingravinoveritas · 4 years ago

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thefeministwarrior replied to your post “Remember those thirty seconds where I tried to...”

I love how everybody decided to show their sexism tonight hating and attacking Ainsley for doing the exact same thing as Martin but still falling head over heels in love with Martin.

Oh, oh, now hold on just a damn minute here, please and thank you.

First of all, my disliking of Ainsley started long before tonight. I had issues with her all the way back to the beginning of season one of PS, but I kept trying to give her a chance. She even started to grow on me a little near the end of the first season...and then fuckery ensued. My reasons for disliking Ainsley have ZERO to do with her being a woman, however, as I have had no problem whatsoever with any of the other female regular characters on the show. Jessica? Total queen. Edrisa? Hilarious and adorable. Dani? Has nice hair. Absolutely no issue with any of these excellent and uniquely fierce ladies, but Ainsley just grated on me from minute one. I never bought her as a reporter, nor did I like the way she treated anyone else in the show (which, again, are all things that WELL preceded tonight’s fuckery).

SECOND OF ALL, let’s examine the reason for the disparity between people’s feelings toward Martin versus Ainsley, despite their similar actions. The reason people like Martin is because Martin is likable. He’s incredibly charming and funny and warm, all things he has cultivated as part of the façade he wears, which is why and how he was able to ensnare his victims. Ainsley has no such charm, no such likability. Even though Martin will gaslight or manipulate Malcolm similarly to how Ainsley did--that he said/did something to “teach Malcolm a lesson,” or to help him--he doesn’t deny the fact that he’s a monster. Ainsley, in contrast, hides it, and went so far as to fully deceive Malcolm about committing a murder (whereas if it were Martin, he’d probably brag about it).

Ainsley: “Oh no, I did this horrible thing, I don’t know what happened, I need your help, Malcolm.” Martin: “My boy! I did this wonderful--I mean, horrible--thing, and I just had to tell you all about it. Isn’t it grand? Come, let’s solve the case and then we can play Parcheesi and run through a field of daisies together!”

...Simply put: Ainsley is Mounds, and Martin is Almond Joy. A lot alike, but one of them has got that extra little something that the other is just lacking entirely. Thank you, and good night...

#thefeministwarrior #reply post #prodigal son #martin whitly #ainsley whitly #i honestly don't know if it's more the character or the actress that is bothering me #but the other difference is that I don't think Martin wants to genuinely cause Malcolm pain #whereas Ainsley didn't seem to care that Malcolm was in pain at all #i'm just going to call him Malcolm Whumpley from here on out #this episode was ridiculous #this show is ridiculous #prodigal son 2x07 #face value #discourse

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jackoshadows · 4 years ago

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Maybe this is me being naive and hopeful but I don't see the point of Dany dying in the books, yeah, I know what happened in the show, but nothing that happened in s8 made sense anyway. Martin spent a ot of time in ADWD with the political and economic aspects of Meereen, with all the problems that making a new system has to erase at the end the character that has that storyline and that will be needed at the end of the book for Westeros rebuilding.

I have to agree. This was what was so disappointing for me as well with season 8. That GRRM spend an entire book on characters like Dany and Jon being leaders and having to make the tough decisions and getting actual experience and the show ending just gets rid of these characters.

I mean, we had Jon spend a chapter literally counting grain and barley and veggies in the store room. Why? We had to read Dany making the hard decisions, right and wrong decisions, compromise, lose and win. All for nothing.

The writing the show gave it’s endgame leaders was abysmal. Tyrion turned into an idiot, they didn’t care about Bran and Sansa’s qualification was making snarky comments.

In Bran’s case, I could see GRRM taking him down the path of Leto II Atreides from Children of Dune, in which scenario he could make King Bran of Westeros work in the books. But D&D did not write ANYTHING at all for Bran. On the other hand, they were really invested in Sansa as a character, they wanted her to be more important on the show, they took story arcs and characterization from other characters in the books for show Sansa and they still could not make queen Sansa work on the show.

And the show’s ending does not gel with GRRM’s take on ruling:

We had GRRM’s entire spiel on what ruling means:

One thing that I am trying to get at in the books, the political aspect if you would, is to kind of show that this stuff is hard. I think that an awful lot of fantasy and even some great fantasy falls under the mistake of assuming that a good man would be a good king and all that is necessary is to be a decent human being and then when you are king everything will go swimmingly. Tolkien is great but we never get into the nitty gritty of Aragorn ruling. What is his tax policy? How does he feel about crop rotation?

How does he handle land disputes between two nobles, both of whom think that they should have the village, so they burn it down to establish their claim. This is the hard part of ruling be it in the middle ages or now. It’s not enough to be a good man to be an effective ruler. It’s complicated and it’s hard and I wanted to show that with repeated examples in my books with my kings and hand of the kings - the prime minister if you would - trying to rule. And whether it be Ned Stark or Tyrion Lannister or Tywin Lannister or Daenerys Targaryen or Cersei Lannister trying to deal with the real challenges that affect anyone trying to rule the 7K or even a city like Meereen and it’s hard.

You know, we can all read the books or read history and say oh, so and so was stupid and made a lot of mistakes and look at all these stupid mistakes they make. But these kind of mistakes are always much more apparent in hind sight than when you are actually faced with the decision about, oh my God, what would I do in this situation. How do I resolve this thing? Do I do the moral thing? But what about the political consequences of the moral thing? Do I do the pragmatic, cynical thing and kind of screw the people who are screwed by it? I mean, it is HARD. And I want to get to all of that - GRRM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJCb3xyWyAg

This statement here?

If I am ever a queen I will make them love me

is an antithesis of everything GRRM says above. This quote shows, to a certain extent, Sansa’s naivete at this point. The Tyrells deliberately cut off food to KL and then Margaery Tyrell distributes food to the people to win their favor. It has nothing to do with the well being of the people here. Sansa sees this and thinks that when she is queen, she will make people love her and some folks think that this points to Sansa being the most compassionate, best queen ever.

That’s why Queen Sansa is so attractive to people who subscribe to the simplistic notion that all ruling entails is being beloved by the people. She’s a blank slate who has yet to negotiate or hash out deals with adults, or make a single decision that affects the lives of the people under her. She’s perfect because she has yet to do anything. The Disney fairy tale version - ironically something Sansa believed in at the start of the books. That’s why Jonsas think that we will get King Jon and Queen Sansa ruling happily ever after.

Dany should by all rights be a popular, beloved leader in Meereen. But it’s not easy. She has to hand out justice which is complicated. She has to start building up an economy from scratch - one not based on slavery. She has to deal with an insurgency, famine, disease. She has to make hard choices and she has to do it surrounded by enemies. The former slaves want her to reopen the fighting pits. Does Dany do the moral thing or what her people want?

Both Jon and Dany make mistakes. They make some emotional decisions that are not right. But to quote Leto II Atriedes when he gives his father’s ring to Stilgar in Children of Dune:

To remind you that all humans make mistakes, and that all leaders are but human.

Dany is not in a similar situation to the rich Tyrells who can ‘buy the vote’ so to speak, by handing out food to the starving populace of KL. Starvation that happened because the Tyrells closed off the Roseroad during the WOT5K. But Sansa is not thinking like the Tyrells here. She genuinely thinks that all it takes to be a good queen is to make her people happy - and it’s that simple.

Jon Snow at the wall, being the head of a military institution, has it easier than Dany. But, not having Dany’s charm and charisma, he has a harder time convincing people that he is making the right decisions. By the time we reach the end of ADwD, Jon knows that he is hated by a majority of the watch.

Jon is not making decisions that are popular or liked by his men. He is making decisions based on defending the realm. Save the lives of the freefolk - and not provide more dead to the Others, save the men he send to Hardhome, prepare the watch, prepare the castles, get more food, train more people etc. He too makes mistakes - fails to read the mood of the people. Fails to take warnings seriously. Undermines the neutrality of the watch by interfering in the affairs of the realm.

Doing a re-read of the Wheel of Time series before the TV adaptation premieres, I am reminded of this line from Rand al’Thor returning to one of the kingdoms he conquered. This is the hero of the story, the good guy.

The pair gathered themselves, drew deep breaths — and saw Rand over the Maidens’ heads. Their eyes nearly popped out of their faces. Each man glanced sideways at the other, and then they were on their knees. One stared fixedly at the floor; the other squeezed his eyes shut, and Perrin heard him praying under his breath. “So am I loved,” Rand said softly. - A Crown of Swords

Ruling is not always about being popular, beloved, compassionate, always being right etc. I doubt GRRM intends it to be that way. He has given several instances of rulers and leaders in his books and as he points out none of them has had it easy. Hindsight is 2020 and all that and leader often times make unpopular decisions.

I am torn on Dany’s ending. On the one hand, I find it hard to believe that GRRM is going to kill off a character that he spend so much time building up as a ruler. She is also one of the big 5, who is mentioned as surviving till the end along with Jon, Arya, Bran and Tyrion in the original outline. Why would he kill off just Dany from the big 5?

But would Benioff and Weiss really kill off Daenerys if she does not die in the books? That’s a really big departure for a central book character. I think GRRM knows the endings of the big 5 - in interviews he has always stated that he knows Jon, Arya and Tyrion’s endings.

So whether Dany lives or dies in the books? I don’t know. It will indeed be very disappointing if she does die though. I want the big 5 to make it and have decently good endings.

#Daenerys Targaryen #anti GOT #anti D&D #On Ruling #GRRM #asoiaf

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esther-dot · 2 years ago

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'Why are Aria stans so obsessed with her becoming QITN and write increasingly deranged metas about that happening?'

So, ok, as someone that watched this shit unfold in realtime back in 2019 let me jump in. Aria fans are now fixated on QITN being her endgame because it was Sansa's endgame. Her stans are like toddlers. You know when a toddler hates apples but then sees a fellow toddler at the playground eating apples so now they want an apple too? Yeah, this is literally what is happening. Trust me if Sansa never became QITN and instead become Lady of the Vale or something Aria stans would want that for her endgame too. I'm sorry but Aria was a literal book fan and show fan fave and there would be weekly viral tweets with tens of thousands of likes praising how BaDaSs she was for 8 years and her fans think that GRRM told D and D Aria became QITN in this triumphant moment and they were like '.....Nah, we're going to give that to Sansa who half the fanbase spent close to a decade hating on....thanks for the input tho George.' Like, really? Really?

This is how I know all those endgames came from Martin. Fan fave Jon gets exiled North and White Soccer Mom Feminist icon KhAlEesI goes dark, carpet bombs a city, and gets killed by another fan fave and people think this shit came from D and D? It killllls me how half the fanbase is still committed to this fiction that D and D just totally pulled those endings out of their ass. It makes no sense.

D and D knew all they had to do to stick the landing on GOT for it to be hailed as one of the best shows ever on television was to give Jon and/or Dani some triumphant coronation after defeating the Evil Queen Cersei and that shit would have been praised by every normie that watched GOT for a decade and their legacies as good, or at least competent, showrunners would have been secured. But they had to stick with those endgames to make GOT still seem like an adaptation of Martin's vision. I would have loved to be in on the meeting where Martin told D and D 'So, yeah it's King Bran, Dani goes dark and Jon kills her, Jon then goes back beyond the wall, and Aria goes off columbusing into the new world....btw, I'm not finishing the last two books so even I don't know how to get to those endpoints. Have fun!!' D and D knew they were fucked in that moment lmao.

(about this ask)

Lmaoooo. Can you imagine? So funny.

Someone said shortly after GoT ended that D&D should have just taken the story in their own direction because their interpretation of the characters and the plot points were so misaligned by the end that even if you accept the endgames as Martin's (which I do), you just can't wrap your mind around them in GoT-verse. And I think if they had, they would not have had Jon or Dany on the throne, so the possibility amuses me. They probably would have had Cersei kill them and stay queen or something😂 I think they're personally too into shock value to have ever been down for a HEA for anyone except a Lannister!

Everyone I knew who watched GoT loved Arya (I did too!), but I have seen comments about her being underappreciated by the fandom which baffled me. I guess it's because her endgame wasn't in political power, so the theory is she didn't get what Martin intended for her because D&D were doing fanservice, but that makes no sense. Sansa was hated, Bran had no fanbase to speak of, Dany would have ended up on top if that was the only factor. Oh well. I think most people reject part, if not most, of the endgame, so I guess I can't act shocked. Jon's ending hurts me a lot, so his is where I allow myself to dabble in a little delusion. My poor boy.

#I do not hate @ry! there is just a lot of bad blood in the fandoms #also. I’m sorry for not adding tags because they search all related tags (even anti) to find people to harass #but you can filter these >>>#dot chat #long post

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a-baleful-howl · 6 years ago

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I’m about to go full-on petty mode. So if you don’t care about my personal gloating and back-patting, scroll on by lol

This post contains spoilers for episode 1 of season 8, and also spoilers for my fic The Lone Wolf Dies.

I recognize this post is really only for me. I’m a salty bitch.

This is fanart the wonderful and lovely @cathcacen drew for me when I was at my lowest and receiving the most hate I’ve ever gotten for a fic.

I ranted about it for a bit, deleted the worst of the flames I could off of FFN, and I haven’t actually been back to FFN since this all happened. Don't think I havent noticed the love and support I got from the JonsaFam, either. I very much appreciated it, and I know many people enjoyed my fic (and are begging me to finish it...).

Here’s some highlights of the comments I received on FFN accusing me of being “unrealistic” or of committing “character assassination” (sad thing is, these aren’t even the worst reviews I got):

“Arya would never let Sansa or the Northern Lords do that to Jon[...]This story is making Jon a bit of a wimp and Arya willing to betray him even though she loves him more than Sansa.” [saphirablue25 on chapter 1]

“Another story about Jonsa, and Anti-Dany, and pro-norte and pro-stark? these crap stories are becoming common since season 7.[...]and this kind of stories, without any artistic or literary value, just deserve to be vilified. is just another excuse to be myopic and criticize character without reason, especially when it is already something practically canon that Jon / Daenerys will be in the books too, as one producer of the HBO series said, who was told George Martin. waste of time.” [flayjunior15 on chapter 1]

“this story is rubbish, more crap without sense…” [guest on chapter 1]

“This is character assassination. Arya Stark would never betray Jon Snow; no matter what;[...]Of course now it’s a Jon and Sansa pairing ignoring everything that happened in season 7 b/c why not?[...] The leaps you Jonsa writers take to mischaracterize daenerys just b/c you’re not getting the ending you want in the show or the books is a little ridiculous. You can’t write a story that’s based on show-canon and then ignore all obstacles presented in said canon just to put your two favorite characters together. That’s not how good storytelling works.” [FanofLogic (lol) on chapter 1]

“I don't think Arya would ever betray Jon, it's just not plausible.[...]There are gaping plot holes, that need to be seriously addressed, the writing and the punctuation are fine, it’s well spaced and makes sense in a linear sense, but in terms of plot and story, it crumbles to dust before you even finish reading the chapter in its entirety.[...]I don’t want to stop you from writing, that’s not my intention, you just need to sit back and ask yourself, if it really makes sense.” [carpenoctem20 on chapter 1]

“Well, I read your story. It is sad really because your writing style is good and enjoyable but the stupidity of your character's actions[...]Too bad, your writing is promising but the story lacks logic…[...]Also, thank you for butchering Arya’s character - she is my favourite and you completely ruined her.” [malb901 on chapter 1]

“I realize that this story is an AU because our characters are written not how they are portray in television or books…” [GUEST VIII on chapter 1]

“If your goal was to write Arya completely out of character and Sansa as a short sighted idiot with the northern lords as her peanut gallery...then good job. Otherwise your characterization needs a lot of work.” [guest on chapter 1]

“Arya...well how she is written is so absurdly offbase from canon you would have been better off write my that part as an of to avoid having preconceived about the character.” [guest on chapter 1]

“What a load of complete garbage. So much character assassination across the board is an injustice to GRRM’s work!” [guest on chapter 1]

“Another junk Jonsa story, I see that many of these losers, are very salty, because their crackship (because that’s the Jonsa, a crack) shipwrecked last season.[...]The author of this story is another salty loser with no sense, just like all the Jonsa fans of this crack ship.[...] even Arya has a stronger relationship with Jon than with any member of her family, she would care less about the North, even threatening to kill the Northern Lord, if they hurt Jon. Only two idiots of Jonsa, defend this story.” [JonsaSucks on chapter 1]

“Highly questionable characterization and plot holes big enough to fly a dragon through...pass” [guest on chapter 2]

“With Arya, she's so OC in this that it would have made more sense to make her a new character. She would never choose Sansa over Jon.” [saphirablue25 on chapter 2]

“So disappointing! This story is a complete disservice to anyone who is not a blind Sansa worshiper.[...]The plot holes don't do you any favors either.” [Zmrzlina763 on chapter 3]

“Poorly written, plot holes, unrealistic” [guest on chapter 3]

“What a pile of crap. So many plot holes and character assassination. You should be ashamed to publish such garbage.” [guest on chapter 4]

“I hated this story...thought it was really ridiculous.” [guest on chapter 4]

“I would highly recommend rereading GRRM’s work as it’s obvious you are basing your characterizations on contrived reimaginings with no basis in the work you claim to be a fan of. Please do us all a favor and quit polluting the fandom with this nonsense.” [guest on chapter 4]

And finally, for the piece de resistance!

“Oh boy that story became retarded real quick” [guest on chapter 1]

Now, I might be biased but my brain kept pointing out similarities to the first episode of season 8 and my fic - which I never claimed to be writing what I thought was really going to happen, but that this what I wished in a best case scenario would, my interpretation of all the info we got from Season 7, and it was always only ever supposed to be a Jonsa one-shot but it kept growing.

Now, one of the biggest complaints I got was “character assassination” - saying that the characters would never behave the way I wrote them to. This is mainly what I want to focus on as clearly the fic is not exactly the same as the episode - and I never expected it to be. Fanfic is fanfic for a reason. For one, Sansa and the North refuse Jon and Dany, and that's kind of the catalyst to everything else that happens in the fic. Thats a big change - so I’m not saying “My fic was exactly like the show!!” I just wanted to point out all the moments while watching the show I was like “See! I didn’t assassinate anyone’s character!” since that’s apparently a crime I was committing against all of fandom.

If you haven’t read the fic, I highly suggest you do since many of these quotes are small snippets taken from a bigger context.

All the text is from my fic, the pictures are the moments I thought were similar from the show.

Daenerys had chosen to forgo her dragons to mount a horse instead, as a show of equality and peace to the Northern people.

The Hound, Sandor Clegane, rode beside them, seemingly reluctant to be there, in his own way.

“Greetings,” she announced. “How gracious for you to meet us.” Though her words were not sweet - they never were - and she measured the air between the two parties cautiously.

“You’ve traveled very far,” Sansa responded, her horse shifting impatiently under her. Her voice did not waver, and it carried loud and clear across the void. “It would be rude of me to not turn you away personally.”

Daenerys remained silent.

“We know no King, but the King in the North whose name is Stark.” Lyanna Mormont bellowed from her own steed. Her eyes were glowering, stern and furious. Not little Lyanna…

“First the Wildlings, and now a foreign whore,” Lord Glover spat, his horse just as wide as he was. “You’re not a Northerner. You’re anything but.”

He looked to Sansa for an answer. Surely Sansa would not leave him to the wolves. Yet she avoided his eye.

“I missed you too, Jon…” she called back, and his heart knew that she meant it. “But Starks stick together. I know that now. What would Father think?” His heart broke. If only they knew…

Jon had warned her. He knew before heading to Dragonstone that the Northerners were not likely to kneel to a foreign ruler. Sansa had said so herself many times. He resisted the urge to gloat, to remind the Dragon Queen of his words.

“Sam?” he whispered. Surely he must be imagining it. Sam was here? In Winterfell? The round man came stumbling towards him, his arms waving madly by his sides to catch Jon's attention.[...] The two clasped each other in a strong embrace for a moment before Jon pulled back. [...] “Gilly?” Jon asked absently. “And the baby?” “They're fine!” Sam answered, finally with a dim smile. “They’re here.”

Arya . Oh, Arya! She’s safe. He frantically grabbed her, sweeping his hands over her hair and face, feverishly kissing the top of her head, thanking the old gods that she was here. Thank the gods his little sister was alive. She had wrapped her arms so tightly around him he could barely breathe.

“You leave him alone!” Arya barked, running swiftly down the hall towards them.

“Don’t you understand what this means, Jon?” Sam insisted. “You’re the heir to the Iron Throne.”

Jon didn’t care about that. Not now. Suddenly everything he thought he knew was a lie. His father- no, his uncle... had lied to him his whole life. This meant that Daenerys was his aunt by blood. And Sansa was his…

He suddenly felt very ill.

[...]Everything tasted bitter to him now. Everything he had ever known was a lie, but oddly, it made sense. Eddard had gone south to save his sister and had returned with a child. It made sense. How - how - had he not seen it before?

[...]People die and stay dead. That was a fact. Unless he had believed more lies than the one his uncle had told him his whole life.

He had traveled on horseback many times, but never alone. [...] When he drew nearer to Winterfell, the snow and winds were so strong he was forced to cover every inch of skin but his eyes.

“You look like you’ve seen the seven hells.”

“You don’t look any better,” Sandor replied. Jaime tried to ignore the slight. It was true he was unshaven, unwashed and frozen to the bone.

“It’s too late,” Bran interrupted. Jon’s blood ran cold at the words.

“What do you mean it’s too late?”

“The Wall is gone. Eastwatch is gone. There is a dragon that breathes blue fire.”

Now, I’m not trying to say “I’m Nostradamus and I guessed the entire first episode.” No. That is absolutely not what I’m saying. I thought I made an informed guess into how the characters might react to the events in season 7 and amongst each other, and used my own opinions on the characterizations to write a story based around one thing: Jon realizing he loved Sansa because she died. Everything else was secondary to me.

It’s only because I got such immediate and hostile push back to something I saw as obvious foreshadowing that made me feel so vindicated when the first episode had so many similarities to what I wrote. Anyone could have come up with these same lines as I did - because the evidence was there and the Jonsa fam was pointing it out the whole time.

I just reallllly hate how fanfiction, especially in ASOIAF and on FFN, has the default accusation of “character assassination” to use when you just hate a story, when all fandom characterizations are just opinions. Only the author of the original source material can decry character assassination. Fanfiction is everyone’s personal choices when it comes to things like this, and it appears that a whole shitload of Dany Stans descended on my story, and instead of saying “I hate Jonsa and Dany can do no wrong” they personally attacked me for horrible writing - when in fact I was the one more on point than they were. I never expected Sansa and the North to literally turn Dany and Jon away at the gates - but thats why I wrote a fanfic about it. Because that was the only way I was going to see it told.

I was so upset by this (can’t you tell? lol) that seeing this episode really made me feel good and feel more proud in what I wrote.

okay. rant over.

#original #text post #s8 #8.01 #my fics #the lone wolf dies #long post

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starringemiliaclarke · 6 years ago

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Emilia Clarke on Game of Thrones finale's shock twist: 'I stand by Daenerys'

Emilia Clarke read a paragraph in the final script for Game of Thrones.

She read it again and again. Seven times, she says, she read the words that revealed the devastating fate of Daenerys Targaryen, a character she’s portrayed on the HBO global phenomenon for nearly a decade.

“What, what, what, WHAT!?” the actress recalls thinking. “Because it comes out of f—king nowhere. I’m flabbergasted. Absolutely never saw that coming.”

It was October 2017. The actress had recently completed filming Solo: A Star Wars Story and had just returned to London following a brief vacation. She electronically received the scripts the moment she landed at Heathrow and recalls that she “completely flipped out,” turned to her traveling companion and said, “‘Oh my god! I gotta go! I gotta go!’ And they’re like, ‘You gotta get your bags!’”

Once at home, the actress prepared herself. “I got myself situated,” she says. “I got my cup of tea. I had to physically prepare the space and then begin reading them.”

Clarke swiped through pages: Daenerys arrives at Winterfell and Sansa doesn’t like her. She discovers Jon Snow is the true heir to the Iron Throne and isn’t thrilled. She fights in the battle against the Night King and survives, but loses longtime friend and protector Ser Jorah Mormont. Then her other close friend and advisor Missandei dies too. Varys betrays her. Jon Snow pulls away. Having lost half her army, two dragons, and nearly everybody she cares about, Daenerys goes full Tagaryen to win: She attacks King’s Landing and kills … thousands of civilians? Daenerys’ longtime conquest achieved, she meets with Jon Snow in the Red Keep throne room and … and then … then he …

“I cried,” Clarke says. “And I went for a walk. I walked out of the house and took my keys and phone and walked back with blisters on my feet. I didn’t come back for five hours. I’m like, ‘How am I going to do this?’”

Sitting next to Clarke on the flight, as it so happens, was Kit Harington, who plays Jon Snow. Harington deliberately hadn’t yet read the scripts so he could experience the story for the first time with all his castmates. Clarke, positively bursting with wanting to talk about her storyline, found the flight maddening. “This literally sums up Kit and I’s friendship,” she says, and sputtered: “Boy! Would you? Seriously? You’re just not?…”

At the table read, Clarke sat across from Harington so she could “watch him compute all of this.” When they got to their final scene together, recalls Harington, “I looked at Emilia and there was a moment of me realizing, ‘No, no…’”

And Clarke nodded back, sadly, ‘Yes…’

“He was crying,” Clarke says. “And then it was kind of great him not having read it.”

The main story driver of Game of Thrones’ final season is the evolution of Daenerys Targaryen from one of the show’s most-loved heroes into a destroyer of cities and would-be dictator. Author George R.R. Martin calls his saga “A Song of Ice and Fire.” Jon Snow is the stable, immovable ice of Winterfell; Daenerys the conquering, unpredictable fire of Dragonstone. After years apart, they came together in season 7. The duo fell in love, help saved the realm from a world-annihilating supernatural threat and, in the series finale, their coupling is destroyed — Daenerys perishes, while a devastated Jon Snow is banished to rejoin the Night’s Watch.

Was this ending Martin’s original plan? The author told showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss the intended conclusion to his unfinished novels years ago but, since then, the HBO version has made several narrative detours. The showrunners are not giving interviews about episode 6 (and told EW they plan to spend the finale offline — “drunk and far away from the Internet” as Benioff put it).

Regardless of the final season’s narrative’s origin, the Thrones writers have planned Dany’s fate for years and have foreshadowed the dark turn in the storyline. In previous seasons, producers would sometimes ask Clarke to play a scene a bit different than what she expected for a seemingly heroic character. “There’s a number of times I’ve been like: ‘Why are you giving me that note?’” Clarke says. “So yes, this has made me look back at all the notes I’ve ever had.”

After Episode 5, “The Bells,” the reaction to Dany’s “Mad Queen” turn has been explosive and frequently negative. Some critics insist Daenerys doesn’t have the capacity for such monumental evil and the twist is an example of female characters being mishandled on the series. Others say Dany’s unstable sociopathic tendencies were indeed established, but the final season moved too fast and flubbed its execution.

For Clarke, the final season arc required mapping out a series of turning points. Dany’s attack on King’s Landing might have seemed abrupt, but from the beginning of the season Daenerys has reacted with increasing anger, desperation and coldness to one setback after another, shifting the Mother of Dragons into new emotional territory that would ultimately lead to her destruction.

Sitting in her dressing room on the set of Thrones last spring, Clarke broke down Daenerys’ entire season 8 internal journey leading up to the apocalyptic King’s Landing firebombing in a single breathless monologue.

“She genuinely starts with the best intentions and truly hopes there isn’t going to be something scuttling her greatest plans,” she says. “The problem is [the Starks] don’t like her and she sees it. She goes, ‘Okay, one chance.’ She gives them that chance and it doesn’t work and she’s too far to turn around. She’s made her bed, she’s laying in it. It’s done. And that’s the thing. I don’t think she realizes until it happens — the real effect of their reactions on her is: ‘I don’t give a s—t.’ This is my whole existence. Since birth! She literally was brought into this world going, ‘Run!’ These f—kers have f—ked everything up, and now it’s, ‘You’re our only hope.’ There’s so much she’s taken on in her duty in life to rectify, so much she’s seen and witnessed and been through and lost and suffered and hurt. Suddenly these people are turning around and saying, ‘We don’t accept you.’ But she’s too far down the line. She’s killed so many people already. I can’t turn this ship around. It’s too much. One by one, you see all these strings being cut. And there’s just this last thread she’s holding onto: There’s this boy. And she thinks, ‘He loves me, and I think that’s enough.’ But is it enough? Is it? And it’s just that hope and wishing that finally there is someone who accepts her for everything she is and … he f—king doesn’t.”

And losing Missandei? “There’s a number of turning points you see for Daenerys in the season, but that’s the biggest break. There’s nothing I will not do after losing Missandei and seeing the sacrifice she was prepared to make for her. That breaks her completely. There’s nothing left to making a tough choice.”

Executing Varys for treason? “She f—king warned him last season. We love Varys. I love [actor Conleth Hill]. But he changes his colors as many times as he wants. She needs to know the people who are supporting her regardless. That was my only option, essentially, is what I mean.”

Burying Cersei Lannister under the collapse of the Red Keep? “With Cersei, it’s a complete no-brainer. Lady’s a crazy motherf—ker. She’s going down.”

Yet Clarke also had another, more personal reaction to Dany’s meltdown. “I have my own feelings [about the storyline] and it’s peppered with my feelings about myself,” she admits. “It’s gotten to that point now where you read [comments about] the character you [have to remind yourself], ‘They’re not talking about you, Emilia, they’re talking about the character.”

Like many actors who have played the same role for a long time, Clarke identifies with her character and has put much of herself into the role. She believes in Daenerys’ confidence, idealism and past acts of compassion. As the actress wrote in a New Yorkeressay in March, she played the Breaker of Chains through some life-threatening personal hardships, secretly enduring two brain aneurysms during her early years on the show. “You go on set and play a badass and you walk through fire and that became the thing that saved me from considering my own mortality,” she wrote. Clarke has drawn strength from Daenerys and infused Daenerys with her strength.

“I genuinely did this, and it’s embarrassing and I’m going to admit it to you,” Clarke says. “I called my mom and—“ Clarke shifts into a tearful voice to perform the conversation as she reenacts the call: “I read the scripts and I don’t want to tell you what happens but can you just talk me off this ledge? It really messed me up.’ And then I asked my mom and brother really weird questions. They were like: ‘What are you asking us this for? What do you mean do I think Daenerys is a good person? Why are you asking us that question? Why do you care what people think of Daenerys? Are you okay?’”

“And I’m all: ‘I’m fine! … But is there anything Daenerys could do that would make you hate her?’”

During EW’s visit to Northern Ireland last March, I took a walk with co-executive producer Bryan Cogman into the dark woods near the production camp. It was around midnight and bitterly cold. Our boots scrunched on the muddy gravel and the bustling sounds of crew activity from the set slowly receded into the distance.

“Emilia has been threading that needle beautifully this season,” Cogman says. “It’s the hardest job anybody has on this show.”

As we pass crew members our voices cautiously go silent. While Dany’s Mad Queen arc was known by all, her death in the finale was a secret even among many who work on the show. Killing Daenerys was a massive and difficult move. On a show that’s introduced dozens of distinctive breakout characters, Daenerys is arguably the most easily identifiable and iconic. She is T-shirts and coffee mugs and posters and bobbleheads and memes and the name of hundreds of kids around the world with GoTfan parents; a fearless figure of female empowerment.

“I still don’t know how I feel about a lot of what happens this season and I helped write it,” Cogman says. “It’s emotionally very challenging. It’s designed to not feel good. That said, I don’t think that’s a bad thing. The best drama is the type you have to think about. There’s a dangerous tendency right now to make art and popular culture to feel safe for everybody and make everybody feel okay when watching and I don’t believe in that. The show is messy and grey and that’s where it’s always lived — from Jaime pushing a little boy out the window to Ned Stark’s death to the Red Wedding. This is the kind of story that’s meant to unsettle you and challenge you and make you think and question. I think that was George’s intent and what David and Dan wanted to do. However you feel about the final episodes of this show I don’t think anybody will ever accuse us of taking the easy way out.”

I point out Daenerys’ final season arc shifts the entire series, or at least her role in it. Upon rewatch, every Daenerys scene will now be viewed differently; the story of the rise of a villain more than a hero.

“Yes, although I don’t know if she’s a villain,” Cogman says. “This is a tragedy. She’s a tragic figure in a very Shakespearean and Greek sense. When Jon asks Tyrion [in the finale] if they were wrong and Tyrion says, ‘Ask me again in 10 years,’ I think that’s valid.”

Tyrion actor Peter Dinklage says the showrunners on set compared Dany’s dragon-bombing of King’s Landing to the U.S. dropping nuclear bombs on the Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki to decisively end World War II in 1945. “That’s what war is,” Dinklage says. “Did we make the right choices in war? How much longer would [WWII] have gone on if we didn’t make horrible decisions? We love Daenerys. All the fans love Daenerys, and she’s doing these things for the greater good. ‘The greater good’ has been in the headlines lately… when freeing everyone for the greater good you’re going to hurt some innocents along the way, unfortunately.”

Gwendoline Christie, who plays Brienne of Tarth, adds there’s another political lesson to be learned in the final season as well. “The signs have actually always been there,” Christie says of Daenerys. “And they’ve been there in ways we felt at the time were just mistakes or controversial. At this time, it’s important to question true motives. This show has always been about power and, more than ever, it’s an interesting illustration that people in pursuit of power can come in many different forms and we need to question everything.”

Killing Daenerys also forever changes Jon Snow, leading to his circular fate: returning to serve the rest of his life at The Wall. Harington spoke about the show’s finale in a production tent on the season 8 set, his voice so cautiously low a recorder could barely pick him up. Harington explained he avoids talking about the death scene on the set, and he and Clarke came up with a secret hand signal to refer to it — touching a fist to their heart.

“I think it’s going to divide,” Harington says of the finale’s fan reaction. “But if you track her story all the way back, she does some terrible things. She crucifies people. She burns people alive. This has been building. So, we have to say to the audience: ‘You’re in denial about this woman as well. You knew something was wrong. You’re culpable, you cheered her on.’”

Harington adds he worries the final two episodes will be accused of being sexist, an ongoing criticism of GoT that has recently resurfaced perhaps more pointedly than ever before. “One of my worries with this is we have Cersei and Dany, two leading women, who fall,” he says. “The justification is: Just because they’re women, why should they be the goodies? They’re the most interesting characters in the show. And that’s what Thrones has always done. You can’t just say the strong women are going to end up the good people. Dany is not a good person. It’s going to open up discussion but there’s nothing done in this show that isn’t truthful to the characters. And when have you ever seen a woman play a dictator?”

There’s plenty of tragedy for Jon as well, he points out. “This is the second woman he’s fallen in love with who dies in his arms and he cradles her in the same way,” Harington notes. “That’s an awful thing. In some ways, Jon did the same thing to [his Wildling lover] Ygritte by training the boy who kills her. This destroys Jon to do this.”

Back in Clarke’s dressing room, the actress is preparing to film one of her final scenes on the series. Understandably, she can’t quite bring herself to feel sorry for Jon Snow.

“Um, he just doesn’t like women does he?” Clarke quips. “He keeps f—king killing them. No. If I were to put myself in his shoes I’m not sure what else he could have done aside from … oh, I dunno, maybe having a discussion with me about it? Ask my opinion? Warn me? It’s like being in the middle of a phone call with your boyfriend and they just hang up and never call you again. ‘Oh, this great thing happened to me at work today —hello?’ And that was 9 years ago…”

Clarke’s phone call metaphor is characteristically witty, and the actress has given some fascinating insight about the season as a whole. But nothing yet quite feels like the bottom, the blunt truth of how she feels about Daenerys’ fate.

“You’re about to ask if me — as Emilia — disagreed with her at any point,” Clarke intuits. “It was a f—king struggle reading the scripts. What I was taught at drama school — and if you print this there will be drama school teachers going ‘that’s bulls—t,’ but here we go: I was told that your character is right. Your character makes a choice and you need to be right with that. An actor should never be afraid to look ugly. We have uglier sides to ourselves. And after 10 years of working on this show, it’s logical. Where else can she go? I tried to think what the ending will be. It’s not like she’s suddenly going to go, ‘Okay, I’m gonna put a kettle on and put cookies in the oven and we’ll just sit down and have a lovely time and pop a few kids out.’ That was never going to happen. She’s a Targaryen.”

“I thought she was going to die,” she continues. “I feel very taken care of as a character in that sense. It’s a very beautiful and touching ending. Hopefully, what you’ll see in that last moment as she’s dying is: There’s the vulnerability — there’s the little girl you met in season 1. See? She’s right there. And now, she’s not there anymore…”

A crew member comes for Clarke and she stands up. It’s time for her to go. Clarke begins to walk away, turns around, breaks away from the staffer, and comes back.

There’s one last thing she wants you to know.

“But having said all of the things I’ve just said…” Clarke says. “I stand by Daenerys. I stand by her! I can’t not.”

Source

Emilia Clarke on Game of Thrones finale’s shock twist: ‘I stand by Daenerys’ was originally published on Enchanting Emilia Clarke | Est 2012

#articles #emilia clarke #game of thrones #interview #game of thrones cast #GOT cast #daenerys targaryen #me before you #terminator

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catherinexlinton · 6 years ago

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I’ve been walking around listening to yt rants of 8.03 and trying to heal my broken hopes, and i can say it right now : it was some ol bullshit. The world I invested my time and heart in, my skills rping those f characters around here on tumblr, the show I was comming back to when all of my life was going downhill, it was all bullshit.

And if you’re trying to find some meaning in this bullshit, then I am sorry, but I judge you, I do, feel free to unfollow : Im not sure if Ill be around tumblr anyways.

What was Jon for ? Why bring him back? He did nothing. He wasn’t the prince who was promised. His parenthood reveal goes to shit. There is no reason for him being targaryen other than for him to sit on the iron throne ( no “his is the song of ice & fire, azor ahai will come from targaryens” prohpecy stuff ) and at this point : who even gives a fuck about this chair anyways ?

White walkers were the ultimate darkness and evil. To show the readers/watchers that politics, conflicts, revange, betrayal, religions our minor poblems are NOT IMPORTANT compared to the greater enemy to be defeated : be it climate change, or death itself, or insert any theory here.

How am I suppose to care about politics and thrones rn ? After the greatest enemy has been defeated?

It’s as if Voldemord was killed in the middle of the series, and now Draco Malfoy is the big bad to be defeated.

As if Sauron was defeated in the middle of Two Towers and now Aragorn’s claim to gondor is all we have to care about. I CALL BULLSHIT ON THAT.

What was Bran for? His almost decade adventure beyond the wall, his ability to CHANGE MADAFUCKIN TIME, his knowledge of everything? To throw some bullshit one liners “chaos is the ledder” or “the things we do for love”? What was he here for? To throw refrencess to better seasons?

Some of the scenes which were VISIBLE, like the dragons flying on clear sky above clouds ( FUCKING MATRIX RIP OFF, OKAY ? ) or lighting the trenches were okay, but what looks good doesn’t make something GOOD, okay ? A person who’s pretty & dum is still dumb? A nicely taken photo of a shit with filters on is still PHOTO OF A SHIT ???!!???

I’m not an expert on the fucking art of war so I’ll leave it out, but one thing : the fuckin dorthraki rode into the open field? WHAT FOR? Oh i know what for, to get that cool shot of their swords dissapearing into darkness, it was PRETTY but it was DUMB!

The fuck jamie lannister, a guy who has one had, managed to fight all night ??? He should be dead. They all should be dead. Alle the people in the crypts should be dead, with sansa, varys, tyrion, gilli&her stupid non-aging baby, all DEAD. They are all just shells of who they were, so it’s a mercy killing at this point.

Fucking Sansa don’t even get me started.... What’s with “once im queen i will make them love me” ? She walks into crypts, doesnt even care about the scared people and children, doesn’t bring them comfort, anything. At least Cersei have some wine for her women during Blackwater battle.

And Arya.... how much I hate her character... after Arya sailed to Bravos she’s as good as dead to me, really. I can’t stand how non-george-martin-overpowered-tomboy she’s become and I don’t get anyone who sees her as “badass”. The line Mel gave her about shutting “brown,blue,green” eyes wasn’t prophecy about killing Night King, it was a probhecy about her becoming a MURDER ASSASIN, bc that’s what her story is about : revange, and becoming a dark shell of a human because the need for revange overcame her = it’s better to let things go sometimes.

They gave her the night king kill bc FEMINISM, YAY, KWEEN SLAY, and if THAT’S how women are empowered right now - by female characters in plot armour killing logic and stripping other characters (Jon/Bran/Dany?) of their purpose in the story - then I am ASHAMED to be a woman.

They should have died... brienne, jamie, podric, tormund, grey worm, missandei, sansa, tyrion, varys, sam, gilly, little sam, + those who were actually killed this episode. At least their deaths would be meaningfull - heroes fighting for humanity against the death, the foe bigger than any of us - I bet now they will get killed for mad!kween d@ny on the battlefield, fighting for a chair.

Or even worse : if they all gonna get happy ending... j0nerys with their incest babies, grey warm&missandei holding hands on the beach somewhere, jamie pushing bran’s wheelchair, while brienne brushes their daughter’s hair and sings jenny’s song.... that will be the ultimate bitchslap for all of us.

I would say to you : fuck the d&d, fuck hbbo, go read books, wait for the REAL ending. But tbh... I don’t even know if we will ever get Winds of Winter. Forget about Dream of Spring! GrrM is 70&doesn’t look healthy enough to live next three decades (don’t want to fatshame or anything, cersei would love me cuz I look like an elephant myself) and mind you.... he hasn’t wrote a good book in like 19 last years? The two last books in asoiaf series weren’t that amazing, Dance of Dragons was HORRIBLE in my opinion actually, heard various reviews about his other work.

Maybe this world, this saga really IS too big for one man... maybe we will never get the ending we were promised, just like the prince that was promised was actually a bravos ninja.... maybe we shouldn’t hate on d&d alone bc george martin is guilty of the same thing they are : pride. He was sure he will be better than Tolkien, with his rian-johnsony’s subverting expectations that he cought himself in a web of plots he can’t solve.... ?

Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe next episode we will see Bran waking up from the coma and the whole last 8 seasons will be just a dream. Hate me all you want, I dare you, but you can’t change the truth : All those hours of rping, video making, art making, listening to asoiaf/got theories an my bus to school, then university, or as I was falling asleep, crying over beloved characters ......

it was all

bullshit.

#rant #anti got #anti d&d #anti g r r martin #anti asoiaf

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tachipaws · 6 years ago

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so uhhhhh

I watched the Game of Thrones finale just a little bit ago

and I have some thoughts

spoilers under the cut.

Firstly, seeing Tyrion find Jaime and Cersei together had me almost burst into tears. As soon as he saw Jaime’s golden hand I kinda thought, oh this is a big gag, the hand will be there with Cersei and Jaime will come sidling out from somewhere, he lived thank god. But no. Jaime died in the arms of a woman he loved, taking all these years of beautiful character development with him. And I don’t say this solely as a Braime fan. I LOVED Jaime’s character. He always tried to do the right thing, and even when he was tempted by Cersei, even when he gave in, he still came back and tried to do what he thought was best. He saved thousands of lives when he killed the Mad King, and he suffered in silence for it. He stood with Brienne and with the Starks in the Battle of Winterfell, even when his own queen refused to send her help. He tried to save Cersei from certain death, and their child, tried to get her to leave and live with him in obscurity, because they would be safe and happy and their child would grow and live. But no. They die, and all it serves is to give Dany her win and Tyrion some last-minute angst. But god, seeing him crouch over his beloved brother and sister, I could feel that he felt responsible for their deaths, and it was heart wrenching to watch.

And then Dany. Oh, beautiful Dany. I’ve loved her character from the start, and all through her arc, even when she made choices that weren’t for the best, even when they put her on a White Savior complex, even when it became clear the writers had lied and were going to make her turn out just like her father. I knew she’d die this episode, but it didn’t make watching it any easier. I had so much hope watching through the series that Dany would be the one to dethrone the Lannisters, give the people a kind and just ruler, and be everything she set out to be. For her to lose so much, from her family to her friends, and then die with nothing as well, broke my heart and even as I sit here typing I have to hold back tears. I loved Danaerys’ character so much, and I’m disgusted that she was turned into a Mad Queen. The writers don’t know jack shit about character development and it really shows with her. She should have grown and realized that maybe she wasn’t best suited for a throne, at least not the one in Westeros, and either become an adviser or return to Mereen when all was said and done. I’m so glad Drogon destroyed the Iron Throne, because it’s nothing but a death sentence anyway. Fuck that throne and fuck the writers for making it so unnecessarily important. Danaerys Targaryan was meant to be different, was meant to break the wheel. But in the end, she was crushed by it like her father and so many others before her. The Targaryans die out after a legacy of incest, mental illness, fear, and death. A complete waste of an incredible character played by an amazingly dedicated actress.

Bran being named King of Westeros was something I knew was coming bc I’d asked for the spoiler, but it was still kind of a surprise in an “are they REALLY gonna do it” kind of way. I really fucking hate that his title is Bran the Broken, as if that’s the only B word that can possibly describe a man who defied death and became the Three-Eyed Raven, but again these writers are fuckin terrible so I guess that’s what we get. I didn’t like how Sam’s idea to have the people choose a ruler was sneered at so harshly. It just shows that everyone there enjoys having all the power, which goes against the characterization of at least half of them. But I guess all the upper-class have to be assholes at least a little, huh. I don’t know if I do or don’t like Bran being the king, but I did like how it was brought up. He is the living history of the realm as Tyrion said, and now he will live on to be its future as well. For a kid who was tossed out of a window after seeing the former queen having sex with her brother, I’d say that’s a pretty good decent glow up of sorts. I almost wish there would be another season, if only to see how Westeros fairs under Bran’s rule with Tyrion at his side. I can only hope everyone lives to see the peace they finally deserve, after suffering so much under the rule of families hungry for fame and riches and titles.

Arya leaving is the one thing I’m just, really fucking bothered by. I don’t recall anywhere her having a desire to travel and see new parts of the world. When she left Westeros she did so because it was life or death. She came home to be with her family. And now she’s leaving them for god knows how long to go god knows where. I can’t believe after all the chaos and death these kids have faced and grown up around, she wouldn’t want to stay in Winterfell to be with Jon and Sansa. I just don’t like it. Arya is one of my top favorite characters and watching her grow from a stubborn child into a ruthless assassin was amazing, but somehow her ending off as an explorer just doesn’t feel quite right.

Jon being sentenced to live out his days in the Watch is the cruelest joke in this whole fucking show. Right back where he started, the bastard son of Ned stark, forced to live out his days in the cold and snow at Castle Black, never to have any family or land of his own. After all the attempts to hype up the R+L=J shit, which so many people figured out way too easily, after uncovering the mystery of his real lineage and discovering he’s one of the only two Targaryans left in existence, after all the struggle within himself of not wanting to take the throne from Dany even though he had a legitimate claim and her Mad Queen story line made her unfit to rule (and after having to listen to Varys insist only men can rule properly, tbh I’m not sad he died, I never liked him and he got what he deserved for that shit), he ends right back where he started. Jon was my first favorite character, and I always hurt for him, how he was raised with the Stark children as Ned’s bastard, how much Catelynn seemed like she wanted to love him like her own but just couldn’t, how much it must have hurt him knowing he was hurting her and her just by existing. I would have loved to see Cat find out the truth and their relationship become something different, as he was the son of her husband’s beloved sister and she would have embraced him with open arms and a thousand apologies. She just didn’t know any different, and by the time Jon knew, it was all too late. He’s lost almost all the family he’s ever known, and all the real family he ever had. His whole character arc amounted to nothing. NOTHING. My only hope is that he just goes off north with Ghost, Tormund, and the wildlings, because who’s gonna bother to make sure? Aegon Targaryan will have never existed.

AT LEAST, he finally gave Ghost the fucking pats that direwolf deserved. I was actually really happy to see Ghost and Tormund again, and even happier to see Jon acknowledge Ghost, who’d been by his side from the very start. I’m at least glad knowing they’ll still be together in the true north.

And now the grand finale, the one thing I was completely satisfied with. Sansa Stark The Queen in the North Seeing the crown placed upon her head, seeing her take her rightful place, and hearing her men shout “THE QUEEN IN THE NORTH” made me feel swollen with pride. Sansa has been through hell and back. She watched her father die at the command of a king who tormented her, she was raped by another man who executed her youngest brother, she lost her mother and her oldest brother to a supposed ally, and spent so many seasons a hostage or a tool for other people. But she fought, and she grew, and she became shrewd and cunning at the table. Sansa calculated every step she made and it saw her to ascend the throne, and take her rightful place as the oldest Stark heir. She secured her people’s land and ensured their safety. I can only imagine how proud Ned, Catelynn, Robb, and Rickon would be if they could see Sansa now. No longer is she the scared, air-headed little girl who just wants to marry a noble man and live life in the luxury she’s always known. She’s a war veteran, a general, a wolf through and through.

I started watching Game of Thrones in season 5 I believe, with a group of friends in a stream. I knew about the show but had just never bothered to sit and watch it. After seasons 6 ended, I figured I may as well start at the beginning and have a better understanding of what’s going to happen in the last 2 seasons. I spent about three or four weeks slowly marathoning it around my oldest daughter’s schedule (she’s only six and there’s no way she’s watching it any time soon lmao) and I couldn’t help but fall in love with the characters, the world itself, and the stories being played out. I have to say though, along with so many others, I’m utterly disappointed at the ending, and season 8 as a whole. It felt unrefined, and rushed, and there was no sense that anything meaningful happened in the end. When I saw the writers so brashly say that story lines were for 8th grade books, I realized just how little they care about actually writing, and this season truly reflects that. The deaths were for shock value more than anything else, and the major conflicts were solved so easily it felt as if all the buildup for them had been for something else entirely. I don’t regret watching Game of Thrones by any means, but I do feel sad for Martin that his beautiful complex stories full of beautiful complex characters, were reduced to nothing more than a circle story. All this talk of breaking the wheel, and yet it just rolled right back around to see the unspoken main character end right where he began. Because what’s the point of a story when there’s CGI dragons and big fight scenes?

#paws.txt #game of thrones #game of thrones finale #got spoilers #got review

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wellhellotragic · 6 years ago

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Now that I’ve slept on it, the more I think about it, the more I actually like last night’s episode.

1) Arya. She has my heart and is the only character I’m 100% invested on the show. But last night, she rediscovered her humanity. The part of herself that she’s been suppressing for the better part of a decade. I get that it seemed fast, but I’m sure there was a lot going on off screen for her. We know that she didn’t actually hate the Hound, not by the time she arrived in Bravos at least. She came to respect him in a way. So after nearly dying at Winterfell, rejecting Gendry, and standing up to Jon, having Sandor remind her that there’s more to live than vengeance makes sense to me. She’s seen what it’s done to him, how it’s harded him, and she doesn’t want that. Throughout the episode she realized more and more that she’s not invincible. That she’s not stone cold. Her list doesn’t matter in the grand scheme or things.

2) Jon. I’ve always said that Jon has been the luckiest of ducks. And he has been (he didn’t even get hit by one piece of rubble last night while Arya was just walking dead last night) but he also had this incredible huge heart and the code of honor that makes him heroic, despite having things fall together for him. Watching the woman he loved fall apart and fall into the grief of the loses she’d suffered was hard on him, but standing up to her soldiers and his own men was harder. As Maester Aemon said, ‘love is the death of duty’ and in this case, Jon is 1 in 10,000.

3) Tyrion. Oh, this poor boy. Did he do something immensely stupid? Yes. Did I shake my head knowing everything was about to go insanely wrong? Yes. Did I like it? Yes. It’s a perfect come circle for these brothers. Jamie risked everything helping Tyrion escape before his execution. And, ya Jamie had the love of his father and sister so he faced a lesser punishment, but after all of this time, Tyrion finally had a chance to something, anything for the only person that’s ever truly loved him and he seized it.

4) Grey Worm. We didn’t see much of him this episode and I don’t have a lot to say, but it’s heartbreaking. He was taken as a baby and molded into this soldier with no emotions, not fear. He was trained to not be human, but since Dany helped rescue him, he’s slowly found out what it means to be a person. To have feelings. To know love and now loss. A few years ago he wouldn’t have cared. He would have just blindly followed orders.

5) Jamie and Cersei. What can I even say. Last night I was pissed that she died the way she did. I wanted something more savage than the comfort of her brother arms. I wanted her to die alone at the hands of someone a little more directly. I wanted Jamie to be the one. Well really I wanted it to be Arya wearing Jamie’s face. But the truth is, sometimes bad people exist and sometimes they just don’t get their just rewards. It’s unfortunate, but it’s life. We don’t always get what we want. This is a messed up work that Martin has created for them, and somehow, her not getting the deeply gratifying gruesome death is fitting. It’s the most messed up version of how it could have happened. Part of me is a little surprised she didn’t win the whole damn thing.

6) Dany. Ok, this is going to be controversial, because I know people have feelings on this whole Mad Queen thing, but to be honest, it’s been a long time coming. I did a rewatch this week as I was cleaning and getting ready to move, and throughout the series, I couldn’t help but to notice that at each turn, Dany’s gut instinct was to use violence. From the moment she got her first real taste of power, she craved it. Yes, she saved her brother when he attacked her, but when he was given his golden crown, she wasn’t sad. She didn’t mourn him. She simply said “I’m better, let’s get my throne.” And from there out, she wanted to bring fire and death to everyone that opposed her. It was only with the guidance of her council and the reminder of who her father truly was that she was able to temper those impulses. But now, with everyone gone except for Grey Worm who is experiencing his own issues, she has no one left to help guide her. No one that she trusts. She’s always had a temper and in a very short amount of time she’s lost every single person that she loved, so it’s really not surprising that she brought the pain last night. Do I think she’s gone mad? No, but she’s definitely going through some stuff and we’re seeing her at her worst right now.

#game of thrones #game of thrones spoilers

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toaquiprashippar · 6 years ago

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“daenerys is a villain, she burns things and executed people...”

Honestly, I don’t know how people are not tired of using this argument. Should we make a list of everyone that has executed or send someone to execute people?

Jon Snow executed the people who killed him, and he also executed Janos Slynt for not obbeying his orders as Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch.

Arya Stark executed Littlefinger, a room full of Freys and Walder Frey himself, not to mention everyone else she has already killed.

Sansa had Littlefinger executed, also let’s not forget how she sent Ramsay’s dogs to “execute”/eat him alive. (not that I wept for any of those deaths)

Robb executed Lord Karstark and he killed a whole bunch of people at war.

Hells, even Catelyn Stark wanted to execute Tyrion, but he was too smart to let himself die like that.

Brienne killed a lot and we know it. She did become a Kingsguard and you don’t become a Kingsguard without some decent amount of blood on your hands or at least the ability to kill.

Podrick killed, let’s not even discuss Bronn.

Cersei burnt down THE FUCKING SEPT OF BAELOR, YUP. Like the Vatican, bae had the audacity. Not to mention everyone else she had killed, from a veery young age *melara hetherspoon*

Jaime executed the mother fucking Mad King. Not to mention everyone else he’s killed his entire life both as a Kingsguard and as Jaime himself.

NED executed the Night’s Watch deserters and I bet all of yours asses how he killed a bunch of people at Robert’s Rebellion and also at the Greyjoy Rebellion.

Tywin Lannister would send someone to die for breakfast.

The Mountain executed as a midnight snack. (Do you call what he did to Elia and the kids execution? I call it murder.)

The Hound is a fine killer, I have no idea of his body count but damn is bigger than most...

Gendry has killed. Davos has killed. Meera has killed. Lysa has killed, she was the one to poison Jon Arryn... and oh so many others I can’t recall rn...

Oh, let’s not forget Littlefinger, shall we? If we’re counting bodies, we just know he was the one to cause the War of the Five Kings so he might have the highest number rn...

Oberyn Martell has killed a lot, he was known as the Red Viper. You don’t get a name like that unless you’re lethal af.

HELLS, TYRION KILLED SHAE AND HIS OWN FATHER.

The list is fucking long, most of all your faves have killed more times than I’ve changed my clothes and I do it a lot. This is Westeros, sweeties, everyone kills everyone. Don’t go ranting on how murderous Daenerys is because Daenerys is a fucking survivor. We’re not discussing everyone’s motives to kill whoever they killed or sent to be executed, so why would you discuss Daenerys’?

She was persecuted her entire life, just for being alive. She survived all sorts of horrors one can imagine: she was raped, beaten, used, sold, manipulated and all sorts of things you can imagine. Don’t you dare call Dany a murderer because she executed two people who decided to die instead of bend the knee to the cause of a deserving Queen instead of a crazy bitch (whom I love, Cersei is that bitch you hate to love and you love to hate, Martin is brilliant with his villains) who blew up a Sept full of innocent people MEANWHILE DAENERYS WAS AT WAR.

Don’t blame Daenerys for burning men who live for rape and kill who thought themselves worthy of deciding what her life should be like.

Don’t blame Daenerys for making the best out of all the shit life threw her way.

Daenerys is not just a survivor, she’s a fighter. She fights for her rights but she also fight for what is right.

“She freed slaves only to slave them again”. Well, fuck you. She is not the Master of the Unsullied or the Dothraki. She freed them all and they decided she was worthy of their loyalty. You doubt me? She asked Missandei if she wanted to go home because she would send her home in a blink of an eye. Instead, she stayed, not because she was made but because she wanted to. Missandei loves Daenerys, as does her followers.

AS DOES JON SNOW, sorry for your bitterness, but Daenerys is not just the Mother of Dragons, she is the BREAKER OF CHAINS, BRIDE OF FIRE, SLAYER OF LIES, THE UNBURNT and she and Jon will rule Westeros, not just because they can conquer the Throne their ancestor built, but because they deserve it. They earned it.

You can bitch about it but nothing you say can take away her merit, hon. So, why not just stop it? It’s 2019, get over it.

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