Game of Thrones: Who is the real villain?

BloatedGuppy

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Alarien said:
That's an interesting take on Dany, and I certainly can't refute it. We'll have to see how it plays out, especially in light of some of the more interesting revelations in book V and how if effects her "birthright." Seems there a few "birthrights" that are going to have to be addressed... without going into actual spoilers (or potential spoilers for some very obvious issues that the GoT community hasn't picked up on that the ASoIAF community probably has).

I would agree on Tywin's impulse, yes. Not so sure on avarice in the literal sense of money. Seems more of a means to the impulse. Certainly important, but I don't think a driving factor.
If you mean...

Aegon...

...then I'm pretty sure...

that he's a Blackfyre pretender. George has been robbling about the Blackfyre pretenders since book one. It's a bit of a Chekov's gun situation.
.

And the same can possibly be said of "Targaryen madness" and Daenerys. She has certainly consistently shown a pull towards violence, and Emilia Clarke is doing the crazy-eyes in recent trailers, so I'm guessing SOMEONE is giving her some characterization tips.

On Tywin, I probably should have said "greed" or "lust", as avarice seems specifically to relate to material gain. He's a man that wants power, respect, status. He wants his enemies crushed and his legacy impermeable.
 

Nimzabaat

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Eamar said:
Alarien said:
Eamar said:
Stryc9 said:
I think the show is trying to set Melisandre up to be some sort of evil witch that is totally up to no good and is manipulating Stannis to get what she wants which is control of Westeros for her own ends.
You didn't get that impression from the books? That's more or less what I assumed from the get-go, though I'm aware this sort of thing can vary depending on where you stand regarding Stannis (I'm not a fan).
Read A Dance with Dragons. There is, finally, a Melisandre chapter, and I think it may actually adjust your perspective of her a bit. I am not sure how she is going to eventually play out, but I made the same assumptions as you both.
I have and it didn't really. That's the beauty of these books though - we all read the same things but come to very different conclusions.
I'm in agreement on the subject of Melisandre. She seems to be the textbook blood-magic/necromancer type. I always thought that if the book characters of Thoros and Melisandre met, it would clear things up quite a bit, and one of them would be dead. Obviously in the TV show they didn't see the extreme differences between the two characters.
 

BloatedGuppy

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Alarien said:
Cersei Lannister is a blithering, drooling moron. I think it's one of the reasons she's so irredeemable and so hated. She's just dumb as a $@*@ing post.

That also gets back to why I really didn't like the show. Still can't get over that one scene in season one where she and Robert "reminisce" over their good moments. Cersei Lannister had no "good moments" with Robert. These two full-on hated each other, for quite a few reasons. Trying to make her more "relate-able" goes against the very spirit of how her character is meant to be portrayed. She, Joffrey, and Ramsay are probably the three least relate-able characters in the entire series.
Cersei was portrayed as an intelligent, if not a top-level schemer in the first three books. She ultimately out maneuvers Tyrion, who is presented as extraordinarily intelligent, and is really only fooled by Littlefinger, who is busy fooling everyone.

In the fourth book she's portrayed as arrogant, out of control, willfully ignorant of history and politics, and prone to bad decisions of hilarious scope. It made for entertaining reading but was something of a retcon of the character we'd been following up to that point.

And I'm pretty sure even at her stupidest she's more relatable than Hoat, or G. Clegane, or any of a great number of veritable psychopaths. Cersei's fatal flaw is hubris. She's not a maniac.
 

Eamar

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BloatedGuppy said:
In the fourth book she's portrayed as arrogant, out of control, willfully ignorant of history and politics, and prone to bad decisions of hilarious scope. It made for entertaining reading but was something of a retcon of the character we'd been following up to that point.
I read that as her (ironically) falling into the same trap as Robert. Once she's actually achieved power, she finds it's not what she thought it would be and falls back on alcohol and sex, becoming sloppy and increasingly incompetent, and even gaining weight, further mirroring the husband she hated. I thought it was quite clever.
 

XMark

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I'd say Littlefinger is the most villanous since most of the chaos in the series was engineered by him, either directly or indirectly. It's all for his personal gain.

Mastemat said:
There is one True Villain of this franchise...

And that's Stupid.

And Cersei Lannister is the biggest supplier of this world's stupid...
"Um.... Milady Queen Regent.... There's rumor about a Targaryen heir with these baby dragons and-"
"hahaha you stupid fool, all the dragons are dead!"

Really... not even gonna... really, Cersei?
I'mma need you to lay off the booze... cause your hitting the stupid juice pretty hard.
You know, there does seem to be a recurring theme in the series of characters so blinded by their own beliefs and principles (or their own arrogance) that they do something incredibly stupid and get killed because of it. The survivors are the ones who know that they need to be flexible and adapt to their situation instead of trying to impose how they think the world should work on reality.

I think Cersei's dumbest mistake was in the last couple of books. She's all like "hey, I'm gonna give this bunch of crazy-ass religious zealots a bunch of power, money, and weapons. This surely won't get out of control and blow up in my face in any way!"
 

BloatedGuppy

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Eamar said:
I read that as her (ironically) falling into the same trap as Robert. Once she's actually achieved power, she finds it's not what she thought it would be and falls back on alcohol and sex, becoming sloppy and increasingly incompetent, and even gaining weight, further mirroring the husband she hated. I thought it was quite clever.
That's a fairly interesting read on it, although Robert appeared to me to be a relatively sane if reasonably ineffectual ruler, whereas Cersei was portrayed as a reckless, paranoid dupe. Is there a single decision she makes in AFFC that isn't almost immediately calamitous?
 

Ishal

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BloatedGuppy said:
Zac Jovanovic said:
One man's villain is another man's hero.
Pretty certain Ramsay Bolton isn't anyone's hero. =P
I would take that loving paragon of a lad over ANY Stark... and I do many any, including Jon and Aria.

The "villains" carry this entire story. Ramsay may be pure evil, but mostly it's just him, Jof, and maaaaybe Gregor Clegaine as the plain mustache twirling cruelty loving villains. Everyone else who does wicked stuff could be classified as an antihero.

The best part about the series is how it deconstructs the typical characters represented by the Starks and completely fucks them. It's illustrated perfectly in the TV show, and the book, but I'll use the TV show as an example. When Catelyn is pleading for Walder to let Rob go. "I swear on my honor as a Stark, my honor as a Tully." They don't even know the consequences of their own actions. The moment Rob fucked over Walder in the books and in the show, he forfeit whatever honor the family had. Yet Cat still thought herself honorable. Not going to lie, when Stoneheart showed up that was one of the first things in the book that really got under my skin. The Starks should be plowed under. Martin seemed to be holding that direction with conviction, but now I have my doubts. I'm sure Jon and the murderous Aria will get their revenge. I'm mostly okay with that, I don't really consider them Starks due to the actions of one and lineage of the other.

But I agree with your earlier post. A conflicting vision is the #1 red flag for things going south. The TV show guys clearly have gotten egos and have their own feelings about the characters, many of which don't jive. It was the same with Mass Effect 3. It started as the Dark Matter/Energy thing, then the writers got switched around and the vision shifted from that to technological singularity. The geth were completely changed to science fantasy bullshit. "Does this unit have a soul?" The hell is that? I pray whatever ending Martin has cooked up doesn't get doctored due to the eclipsing popularity of the TV show.
 

Alarien

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I don't know that I'd consider Hoat or Gregor on the list of relate-able or not simply because they are mostly background characters. Yes, they are around a lot, but they never have the strong direct impact on characters that the ones I mentioned do. Certainly, you are correct, they are extreme psychopaths and would not be relate-able, but I think the difference, for me (and why I even forgot to mention them) is that Cersei, Joffrey, and Ramsay are front-and-center in their time on the page.

I also don't know if I agree on Cersei's intelligence in books 1 through 3. I would keep in mind that during that time:

(err, not sure how far the show has gone yet so... spoiler time)
Obviously, Tywin is alive and actively manipulating things in King's Landing, though not directly. It's more that he's using his hands there, though people like Tyrion, Jaime, and Kevan to keep things in check. Also, he obviously has some communication with Varys. Another important personage at that time in King's Landing is Petyr Baelish.

I would argue that Littlefinger does more for keeping things operating on an even keel (to his own benefit) than anyone except for potentially Tyrion (who does his partially through Varys).

Basically, you have several people with a vested interest in keeping the realm on a fairly status quo state, all of whom are rather intelligent, clever individuals. Because of this, they are able to keep things in line and, by juxtaposition, Cersei doesn't seem to be completely out of control.

However, by the fourth book, all of these people have either died, or fled King's Landing, and now Joffrey is dead, leaving Cersei squarely in charge with not a single even-keeled person to help rein in the "crazy stupid." Even Jaime has abandoned her, for the most part, at this point.

I don't think it's a retcon, so much as you are seeing her now as she is without the previous controlling and guiding factors.

Ok, and on the other subject of birthrights...

NOW WE ARE IN SUPER SPOILER AS WELL AS CONJECTURE TERRITORY. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Not just Aegon, though it's interesting that you think he's actually a Blackfyre pretender. That's absolutely a real possibility at this point. However, considering that the sack of King's Landing was almost inevitable given the situation in Westeros, it's absolutely possible that a mind like Varys could have foreseen the need to save Aegon by switching him with another, and he would have had the resources to do just that. Given what we've seen of Varys so far, it's entirely possible that he's had a Targaryen return to the throne planned from the start and that both Dany and Aegon are outcomes of a multi-pronged strategy to see that any usurper family fails. He obviously wants to see the Lannisters fail, as he murdered Kevan, the last potential rational guide for Cersei, and that he's seemed rather in bed with Littlefinger, who was one of the many figures who likely had a hand in the death of Joffrey (along with Olenna Tyrell).

No, I was actually referring to Jon, considering the very real possibility (likelihood, if you prefer, though in my opinion at this point, downright certainty) that Jon is the son of Rhaegar and Lyanna. If you are not yet aware of the Rhaegar-Lyanna connection, there are many many discussions of it on the web, so I won't elucidate on that, but I will say that, for me, the evidence isn't just compelling, it's overwhelming considering the personalities of Ned, Lyanna, Rhaegar, the circumstances of Lyanna's "kidnapping and rape," her death "in her bed of blood" (a reference to giving birth), the promise she makes Ned swear, and the fact that she's actually being protected at the Tower of Joy by three of the Kingsguard, including the Lord Commander (despite the fact that Rhaegar, Elia and their kids were elsewhere, as well as Aerys).

Basically, if Jon is Rhaegar's son, then the proper line of succession for the Targaryen Iron Throne would be:

1. Aegon (Rhaegar's oldest legitimate son), assuming he is not a pretender
2. Daenarys (Aerys' oldest surviving legitimate child, if there were no others)
3. Jon (Rhaegar's oldest illegitimate son, but only if legitimized)

And then we get on to the fun part: Robb legitimized Jon before his death and made him the heir to the North (which would normally be on Bran (crippled and not likely to be a king, especially as a greenseer) or Rickon (c'mon, we all know Rickon is the next King Beyond the Wall).

This makes Jon #1 in line for the King in the North and #2 in line for the Iron Throne, once his birth is established.

Oh, and who has the papers making him legitimate and is the only person to know anything about Jon's birth and parentage? Howland Reed, who has not yet shown up in the books.

But Jon is bound to the Night's Watch right? Nope.

The Night's Watch oath is only until death. Jon died at the end of Book V.

Melisandre is on hand to bring him back to life.

Jon can be resurrected, will have essentially fulfilled his oath to the watch. The Wall is coming down, we all know it, so that's sorta moot anyway. Howland Reed can show up and establish Jon's legitimacy and claim on two thrones, and things will get all kinds of whacky from there.

In the end, I see an amusing relationship developing between Dany and Jon, which would not be outside established Targaryen tradition.
 

Eamar

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BloatedGuppy said:
Eamar said:
I read that as her (ironically) falling into the same trap as Robert. Once she's actually achieved power, she finds it's not what she thought it would be and falls back on alcohol and sex, becoming sloppy and increasingly incompetent, and even gaining weight, further mirroring the husband she hated. I thought it was quite clever.
That's a fairly interesting read on it, although Robert appeared to me to be a relatively sane if reasonably ineffectual ruler, whereas Cersei was portrayed as a reckless, paranoid dupe. Is there a single decision she makes in AFFC that isn't almost immediately calamitous?
Again, I think that's about them each becoming what they thought a ruler should be. Robert was pretty much entirely hands-off as far as the actual running of the kingdom went, because he was too busy putting on big public displays of his kingship (tourneys, epic hunts, etc). Cersei despises this and goes the other way, thinking she has to have total control, be a perfect judge of character, and must immediately come down hard on anyone and everyone who disagrees with her (making her reckless). She internalises all this and starts to believe her own lines, making her paranoid.

As for your last question, I certainly can't think of any, but I took that as a sign that ruling requires more than just a degree of cleverness. I felt that most of Cersei's decisions, while obviously wrong from our privileged point of view as the reader, were kind of understandable from her point of view. From there, it's a domino effect. Her refusal to ever admit that she's wrong causes her to dig deeper and deeper holes for herself.

EDIT: Above all, Cersei's actions lead to the more or less compete dismantling of the Council who had (just about) kept things ticking over during Robert's reign. Again, her belief that the ruler should have complete control and her desire to not be like Robert cause her to shoot herself in the foot.
 

Breaker deGodot

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I would argue the closest thing to a human villain the series has is Littlefinger. Seriously. He started so much shit.
 

BloatedGuppy

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Alarien said:
Ok, and on the other subject of birthrights...

NOW WE ARE IN SUPER SPOILER AS WELL AS CONJECTURE TERRITORY. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Not just Aegon, though it's interesting that you think he's actually a Blackfyre pretender. That's absolutely a real possibility at this point. However, considering that the sack of King's Landing was almost inevitable given the situation in Westeros, it's absolutely possible that a mind like Varys could have foreseen the need to save Aegon by switching him with another, and he would have had the resources to do just that. Given what we've seen of Varys so far, it's entirely possible that he's had a Targaryen return to the throne planned from the start and that both Dany and Aegon are outcomes of a multi-pronged strategy to see that any usurper family fails. He obviously wants to see the Lannisters fail, as he murdered Kevan, the last potential rational guide for Cersei, and that he's seemed rather in bed with Littlefinger, who was one of the many figures who likely had a hand in the death of Joffrey (along with Olenna Tyrell).

No, I was actually referring to Jon, considering the very real possibility (likelihood, if you prefer, though in my opinion at this point, downright certainty) that Jon is the son of Rhaegar and Lyanna. If you are not yet aware of the Rhaegar-Lyanna connection, there are many many discussions of it on the web, so I won't elucidate on that, but I will say that, for me, the evidence isn't just compelling, it's overwhelming considering the personalities of Ned, Lyanna, Rhaegar, the circumstances of Lyanna's "kidnapping and rape," her death "in her bed of blood" (a reference to giving birth), the promise she makes Ned swear, and the fact that she's actually being protected at the Tower of Joy by three of the Kingsguard, including the Lord Commander (despite the fact that Rhaegar, Elia and their kids were elsewhere, as well as Aerys).

Basically, if Jon is Rhaegar's son, then the proper line of succession for the Targaryen Iron Throne would be:

1. Aegon (Rhaegar's oldest legitimate son), assuming he is not a pretender
2. Daenarys (Aerys' oldest surviving legitimate child, if there were no others)
3. Jon (Rhaegar's oldest illegitimate son, but only if legitimized)

And then we get on to the fun part: Robb legitimized Jon before his death and made him the heir to the North (which would normally be on Bran (crippled and not likely to be a king, especially as a greenseer) or Rickon (c'mon, we all know Rickon is the next King Beyond the Wall).

This makes Jon #1 in line for the King in the North and #2 in line for the Iron Throne, once his birth is established.

Oh, and who has the papers making him legitimate and is the only person to know anything about Jon's birth and parentage? Howland Reed, who has not yet shown up in the books.

But Jon is bound to the Night's Watch right? Nope.

The Night's Watch oath is only until death. Jon died at the end of Book V.

Melisandre is on hand to bring him back to life.

Jon can be resurrected, will have essentially fulfilled his oath to the watch. The Wall is coming down, we all know it, so that's sorta moot anyway. Howland Reed can show up and establish Jon's legitimacy and claim on two thrones, and things will get all kinds of whacky from there.

In the end, I see an amusing relationship developing between Dany and Jon, which would not be outside established Targaryen tradition.
Quite silly of me to forget about Jon, and I'm quite familiar with R/L, and it's quite evidently the case. However, Jon is having the issue of being dead. While Melisandre is obviously on hand to bring him back, the people who get brought back aren't really...quite right. Jon is most certainly not going to go on to rule the Seven Kingdoms. Beric could barely even remember his name towards the end. I think the real question with Dany and Jon is what role will each play in a re-enactment of Azor Ahai and Nissa Nissa?

Also...while the obvious theory is Melisandre going all Thoros on him, there's the side possibility Jon lives on through Ghost. Not to bring up Chekov's gun again, but that prologue chapter with Sixskins seems MORE than a little pointed in light of what happens to Jon, doesn't it?

Eamar said:
Again, I think that's about them each becoming what they thought a ruler should be.
It's a good reading of her behavior, really. I still think her AFFC chapters are a bit on the clown show side of things, but there's food for thought in your analysis.
 

Eamar

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Alarien said:
spoilery snip
Just wanted to say that I pretty much exactly share your theory about Jon. *high five*

As for the other thing, I don't believe for one moment that Aegon's the real deal, but admittedly that's just my gut feeling.
 

Alarien

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XMark said:
I'd say Littlefinger is the most villanous since most of the chaos in the series was engineered by him, either directly or indirectly. It's all for his personal gain.
I disagree. I think Littlefinger is the story's wildcard. His motives are not clear, especially after book IV where he's

essentially set up an actual proper heir to the Vale with a marriage to Sansa Stark, which would create a strong North/Vale alliance and potential heir to both. This would create an interesting counter-point to the Lannisters in King's Landing and threat to them.

It would also create a situation where he would eventually lose the tentative control that he appears to have established over part of the Vale.

I don't know that I see that as greed. It seems that Littlefinger's lack of predictability might extend to his motives.

And that leads me to some conjecture that hasn't played out much yet, so I don't have to spoiler it.

I don't think Littlefinger is who he says he is. He makes a great point of explaining his father's history as some hedge knight who was rewarded with a small stake in the Vale, on the fingers, where it's all rocks.

However, that doesn't seem to ring overly true to me. First off, he specifically refuses his father's seal, which is a giant's fist or something. Instead, he specifically chooses the mockingbird. This seems like it should be significant, since Martin never does anything that doesn't eventually become significant.

Then, consider this: Baelish was a ward of the Tully's, raised with Lysa and Caitlin. Now, in Martin's world, have we seen any hedge kids or lesser nobles raised as wards of the ruler of one of the Seven Kingdom's main families? Not that I've seen. Jon Arryn's wards were Ned Stark and Robert Barratheon. Ned's ward is Theon Greyjoy.

If Baelish was to be raised as a ward, the only reasonable person who might have raised him was Jon Arryn. Instead, he was raised at the Tully court. This seems horribly non-sensical for some hedge knight's kid from another region to be raised with the daughters of the most powerful family of the Riverlands.

Doesn't work for me. I think Littlefinger is someone else.

So, I went digging into Littlefinger's description and the only place I could find physical features that seems consistent with Littlefinger's was the Martells.

If I had to just throw out a guess, I'd say it seems like Baelish is a Martell plant; part of Doran's schemes to undermine King's Landing and the Lannisters. Doran, despite appearing complacent, has had, it seems, more than a few plans on how to get back at the Lannisters for Elia's death and I would not be surprised to find out that Littlefinger's placement in a position to move up into the King's Landings courts is potentially part of that.

Needless to say, I think finding out what Littlefinger's long term game is (he does seem to be playing the long game) and any potential revelations about his parentage, will have a significant impact on the development of the story.
 

Batadon

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Eamar said:
BloatedGuppy said:
In the fourth book she's portrayed as arrogant, out of control, willfully ignorant of history and politics, and prone to bad decisions of hilarious scope. It made for entertaining reading but was something of a retcon of the character we'd been following up to that point.
I read that as her (ironically) falling into the same trap as Robert. Once she's actually achieved power, she finds it's not what she thought it would be and falls back on alcohol and sex, becoming sloppy and increasingly incompetent, and even gaining weight, further mirroring the husband she hated. I thought it was quite clever.
It's not really a retcon, the whole thing at the end of A Storm of Swords where

SPOILERS FOR SHOW-WATCHERS
Joffrey gets what he had coming to him

messed her up in the head pretty bad, and directly leads to her making a series of increasingly poor decisions (which I found pretty entertaining personally).

As for "main villain", it's really the threat of The Others looming over everything so far. That and the lack of communication in this world, a phone call or two would have gone a long way in stopping all of this ;-)
 

Alarien

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Let's just call this the ALL SPOILERS ALL THE TIME thread. :D

BloatedGuppy said:
Quite silly of me to forget about Jon, and I'm quite familiar with R/L, and it's quite evidently the case. However, Jon is having the issue of being dead. While Melisandre is obviously on hand to bring him back, the people who get brought back aren't really...quite right. Jon is most certainly not going to go on to rule the Seven Kingdoms. Beric could barely even remember his name towards the end. I think the real question with Dany and Jon is what role will each play in a re-enactment of Azor Ahai and Nissa Nissa?

Also...while the obvious theory is Melisandre going all Thoros on him, there's the side possibility Jon lives on through Ghost. Not to bring up Chekov's gun again, but that prologue chapter with Sixskins seems MORE than a little pointed in light of what happens to Jon, doesn't it?
Response:

It's possible. I think it's open for Martin to go either way. However, I don't think the Sixskins reference was really meant to be geared towards Jon. It is the second time we've seen this anyway (unless I'm forgetting another) considering Oren earlier in the stories). I do think the most likely situation is Jon comes back and is fairly ok. While Beric had issues, he was also resurrected many, many times. Caitlyn, on the other hand, was dead a long time. No one was "on hand" like Thoros to bring her back. How much of her was lost? Who knows? Honestly, I doubt terribly much, because I don't think Stoneheart Caitlyn is much different from live Caitlyn, just with any pretense stripped away.

As you can see, I don't like Caitlyn very much. At least now, I think she's fairly honest.

I do think you're right though. The entire Azor Ahai and Nissa Nissa story is being pointed directly at Jon and Dany, and everything will finally revolve around how that turns out.
 

DementedSheep

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From books not TV (I haven't seen much of it): Well aside from the white walkers I think Danny is a possibility with the way she is going despite the (mostly) good intentions but I don't actually like her very much so that might just be me. Other than that...littlefinger? I think he's going to get out gambited by Sansa one of these days though. Maybe Melisandre? Her POV chapters show she at least believes her own stuff but that doesn't mean she isn't a villain. Arya's not on a great track but I don't think she'll end up a major villain. Bran is being ah, somewhat creepy with his
repeated possessing of Hodor. Doesn't say good things about his morality
so maybe him? Either way it's worrying and he really needs someone to tell him that this is wrong.
Most of the outright villainous characters, like Ramsay aren't really major.
 

WouldYouKindly

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The obvious answer is the white walkers. Who else wants to kill everyone who doesn't sacrifice children to them?

Seriously, all this iron throne bullshit is of secondary importance while that threat exists.
 

BloatedGuppy

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Alarien said:
Let's just call this the ALL SPOILERS ALL THE TIME thread. :D

BloatedGuppy said:
Quite silly of me to forget about Jon, and I'm quite familiar with R/L, and it's quite evidently the case. However, Jon is having the issue of being dead. While Melisandre is obviously on hand to bring him back, the people who get brought back aren't really...quite right. Jon is most certainly not going to go on to rule the Seven Kingdoms. Beric could barely even remember his name towards the end. I think the real question with Dany and Jon is what role will each play in a re-enactment of Azor Ahai and Nissa Nissa?

Also...while the obvious theory is Melisandre going all Thoros on him, there's the side possibility Jon lives on through Ghost. Not to bring up Chekov's gun again, but that prologue chapter with Sixskins seems MORE than a little pointed in light of what happens to Jon, doesn't it?
Response:

It's possible. I think it's open for Martin to go either way. However, I don't think the Sixskins reference was really meant to be geared towards Jon. It is the second time we've seen this anyway (unless I'm forgetting another) considering Oren earlier in the stories). I do think the most likely situation is Jon comes back and is fairly ok. While Beric had issues, he was also resurrected many, many times. Caitlyn, on the other hand, was dead a long time. No one was "on hand" like Thoros to bring her back. How much of her was lost? Who knows? Honestly, I doubt terribly much, because I don't think Stoneheart Caitlyn is much different from live Caitlyn, just with any pretense stripped away.

As you can see, I don't like Caitlyn very much. At least now, I think she's fairly honest.

I do think you're right though. The entire Azor Ahai and Nissa Nissa story is being pointed directly at Jon and Dany, and everything will finally revolve around how that turns out.
I'm not even going to edit your original quote to save space. Too many spoiler tags inside spoiler tags.

Time for some spoiler tags!

Oh I think it was. In the very book an insanely popular warg dies, we get an opening chapter that is basically structured for no other purpose than to communicate OH BTW GUYZ IF A WARG DIES HE LIVES INSIDE HIS BEAST FOR A LONG TIME. It doesn't strike me as Martin's usual brand of interesting world-building addendums. His prologues and epilogues are usually heavy on foreshadowing or setting up tone/future conflicts. They're never just toss-offs. And Varamyr's chapter, if not meant to inform us of eventual outcomes for Jon or the other Stark wargs...is exactly that. A meaningless sidebar featuring a secondary character.

Poor Catelyn. She gets a bit of a raw deal from readers. Like Sansa, who I think is the single most underrated/unfairly hated character in the entire series.

Well, let's not forget Bran. Bran is going to have a pretty heavy impact. The Starks in general are. And if you believe Jon is fundamentally a Targ first, where does that leave Bran et al?

George loves to subvert tropes almost as much as Abercrombie, so I doubt we're going to get the traditional high fantasy ending all these portentous events seem to want to point to. Unless Benioff and Weiss end up writing it.
 

balladbird

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BloatedGuppy said:
Zac Jovanovic said:
One man's villain is another man's hero.
Pretty certain Ramsay Bolton isn't anyone's hero. =P
Dear lord, I hope not. XD though he does have that "the joker" level of self-awareness that keeps him entertaining... not that it stops me from hoping he dies a terrible death.


As to the villain of GoT... it's the readers/watchers... our mass love seems to be what dictates who dies where.

Stark blood is on your hands, viewer.
 

Stryc9

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Nov 12, 2008
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Exterminas said:
Eamar said:
Stryc9 said:
I think the show is trying to set Melisandre up to be some sort of evil witch that is totally up to no good and is manipulating Stannis to get what she wants which is control of Westeros for her own ends.
You didn't get that impression from the books? That's more or less what I assumed from the get-go, though I'm aware this sort of thing can vary depending on where you stand regarding Stannis (I'm not a fan).
Funny. In the books I got the expression that Melisandre genuinely believes that she is saving the world by enforcing the prophecy on Stannis.

There is even one view-point chapter about her (In the last book, I believe), that earned her a lot of sympathy points for me.

Sure, she is manipulative and has her own agenda, but in Westeros that is like a driver's license.
Pretty much this. I'm most of the way through Storm of Swords right now and the bit where she does the leeches in the fire thing are two totally different events in the book and the show.

In the show she acts all too willing to do it and in the book she warns Stannis that it won't have the desired effect. In the books she has her limits as to what she's willing to do and genuinely believes that what she is doing is right. When I'm reading the books I'm also more aware that she and Thoros are essentially trying to accomplish the same thing and Thoros isn't exactly that bad of a guy.

balladbird said:
Pretty certain Ramsay Bolton isn't anyone's hero. =P
Going strictly on the events in the show and what he does to Theon, he's kind of my hero. I've hated Theon since I started watching the show, the books don't improve him any either.