I wonder if s2 Aegon will become what we wanted Viserys to be in s1. I just see so many similarities between these two that the fact that we’re obviously meant to dislike Aegon in s1 makes me think they’re going to flip the tables in s2 and actually show him try to do everything his father didn’t when he has to deal with the same ol’ familial and political bs. Starting with him actually trusting his own brother, but ultimately showing how kings are damned if they do and damned if they don’t because everyone else has too many personal interests and vendettas to be able to rule perfectly.

Hey, this is a bit of topic, but since we mentioned Otto recently, I just realized that Otto wasn’t actually there when Viserys ordered the Maesters to cut Aemma open ( and outed himself as the monster he truly is ) so all he was informed of was probably that the Queen had simply passed in childbirth. What I’m trying to say is that this fact makes his decision to marry Alicent to the king a lot less horrible that if he had known the truth.

Because if you look at Otto’s character as a whole he isn’t all that terrible ( for example compared to Tywin Lannister). I always found his decision to marry Alicent to the king slightly out of character until I realized that all he saw from his perspective was a man who had lost his wife ( like he himself had ) and grieved her a lot, again because he probably didn’t know that all this time Viserys was just feeling guilt for having murdered his wife. So in a way I can understand why he would look at Viserys, a man he saw as a caring father to his only daughter and loving and devoted husband to Aemma ( as far as Otto knew ) and thought; he’s husband material for Alicent.

Especially if you compare that to the husband material bar in Westeros which is as low as can be.

Plus if he had caught wind of Viserys supposed idea to marry Alicent to Deamon in order to put an end to Otto and Deamon’s feud I can see why he thought that Viserys would be the better option.

Or am I being to optimistic about his motivations? 😅

I think I’d say that is a charitable read. Otto was still there for a good chunk of viserys life with aemma. Since he was hand for two kings before him. He may not have known the inner working of their relationship, but he must have saw how many times aemma was pregnant. Now just based on the little we get of aemma, she probably felt like it was her obligation to give viserys a boy. But I think otto is a very smart man. I feel he had to know that was not going to end well (healthy wise that is) for aemma.

That being said, and perhaps this is me giving him too much credit, but I don’t think he thought viserys would stand so headstrong on his decision of naming Rhaenyra heir. Let’s be real, viserys is an extremely wishy washy, reactionary person. Otto probably thought he would be no different this time. It doesn’t negate otto putting his daughter in that precarious situation to begin with. But I do wonder how gung-ho he would’ve been about sending Alicent to viserys if he knew that their (the Hightower/targ) kids would end up being ignored and neglected, and Aegon would be named till after the fact. Bc we even see in ep 3 before and during the hunt, when he is talking to Hobert, that he is starting to read the tea leaves a bit. He said that he doesn’t think the king sees it that way (in terms of naming Aegon heir). And all Hobert says is that it is Otto’s job to change his mind. Hence him offering that nyra marry Aegon. In ep 4, we see him contemplating if he should even tell viserys about the nyra and daemon news. And then of course the rain scene with Alicent.

I said this before that while I do think otto knows what he was doing mentioning nyra could put the kids to the sword, and how Alicent would react to that. I do also think he was being serious and was worried for his daughter now being alone. I think that is what makes otto so interesting. He is manipulative, and maniacal but I do think love is there for Alicent. As fucked as as it is. It the same way I feel about Alicent with her kids naming Aegon.

Like I do kind of believe him when he’s like “but I made you queen??? Isn’t that great???”. Bc when you grow up the way he has (the way Alicent has) working your way up that ladder to positions like the hand and queen is considered ‘a win’. But that does not account for all the trauma he put his daughter through.

Anon: /post/641784382183604224/send-me-a-character-and-ill-do-this Daenerys and Kikyo :)

My two queens <3 Thank you for this ask, anon! 

Dany

Sexuality Headcanon: Bi! I think she leans more towards men though Gender Headcanon: Cisgender woman A ship I have with said character: Jonerys, definitely. I think GRRM did a great job with their parallels and their similar traits, and I also just want Dany to be happy with someone her age who understands her as well as Jon could. A BROTP I have with said character: Missandei. The part in the books when Dany promises Missandei she’ll send her back to Naath if she just said she wanted to go back, and Missandei replying that she’d rather stay with Dany, is insanely sweet. I wish GRRM gave us more scenes of them together, honestly. I also love Dany’s relationships with her handmaidens and bloodriders, in general. A NOTP I have with said character: Dany/Drogo. Their relationship is just... squick all around. I do find it sad how Dany misses him so much, though.  A random headcanon: It’s sort of difficult to headcanon anything for Dany because the books already gives us such thorough insight into her, but I’d say I think she made friends with a lot of different people that she met when she was young, traveling around the Free Cities. It would often make Viserys angry, and he’d tell her that a Targaryen mingling with such “lesser beings” wasn’t acceptable.  General Opinion over said character: I love her and I want her to be happy; she’s one of my favorite characters in any series, and by far my favorite character in ASOIAF. She deserves to be queen, she deserves to have all her dragons in the end, she deserves to be with someone who will cherish and love her, she deserves everything. I also believe she’s just a very revolutionary female character in general; I’ve hardly seen any female character who is the chosen hero of several prophecies, has power as a ruler that doesn’t come from her connection with a man, has dragons, is charismatic, especially while at the same time still being as sweet and loving as Dany is. And I fucking love it. 

Kikyou

Sexuality Headcanon: Bisexual and demisexual Gender Headcanon: Cisgender woman A ship I have with said character: I have a lot of Kikyou ships, but I’ve always been partial to Sesshomaru/Kikyou. Since they’re insanely similar in personality, I think that they would have had a quiet but tender relationship based on understanding and trust. And both of them learning to let their guard down a little, coming to rely on each other grudgingly... it would have been so cute.  A BROTP I have with said character: I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more if she got more interactions with Kagome and the two actually became closer - I believe they would have been great friends.  A NOTP I have with said character: Not exactly NOTP material, but I’ve never really felt Suikotsu/Kikyou. It just feels to me like they respected, and, as a result, cared about, each other.  A random headcanon: Kikyou is a very good singer. She’d often sing lullabies to Kaede to help her sister sleep, and it went on up until the point that she died. Early on after her death, Kaede had trouble falling asleep because Kikyou was no longer there to sing to her.  General Opinion over said character: Kikyou is extremely near and dear to my heart because she was probably one of the first characters that I stanned. She had such a tragic life, and although I’m glad she’s at peace (she’s chilling in heaven with smoothies and no one can change my mind), I wish she could have been able to live happily at the end of the story, somehow. She’s stayed one of my favorite characters, is definitely my favorite character in Inuyasha, and even though I read the manga about ten years ago, this woman lives rent free in my head every day. 

Ask Meme

This might be a lot since there’s so many characters in APWH, but could you share something secret about each character that no one else knows or maybe just a fun fact?

I am so sorry I’m answering this so late- I try not to be a human disaster, but inevitably end up being one most days.

Oooooooh this one is very interesting- they might not all be secrets, because for some characters, that would be giving away major plot points, but fun facts I can do! Let’s see what I’ve got (below the cut):

Robb: Has definitely licked a bone on a dare before, is actually a decent artist (much like Sansa) and does a fair amount of sketching in the field, and has an engagement ring for Tal in his work locker that no one knows about yet :) Inherited Catelyn’s ability for leadership, and is really good at dealing with Logistics, management, and the bureaucracy involved in his job. Hangs out with the experimental archeology students a lot (he’s like the accidental older brother for half the department) and would definitely wear handmade linen armor from someone’s project and let an undergrad shoot arrows at him to test it. (For those of you unaware, linen armor is next to impossible to cut without an extremely specific and sharp type of electric saw). Is good friends with Sarella, who’s going through grad school in Oldtown as well. Has been reluctantly dragged into the feud between the archaeology/anthropology and paleontology departments.

Aegon: is a fairly talented piano player, has always liked to cook, but got really good at it when he was dating an adjunct professor in grad school (none of his family knows about the relationship, but Theon does). Has been taking night classes recently to try and learn the Old Tongue bc he and Lyanna are particularly close. Dates casually, and volunteers at a community center for at-risk kids in Kings Landing on weekends. Is the only Targ sibling emotionally aware enough to spend time with Viserys, and is his grandmother Rhaella’s favorite.  

Rhae: Actually really likes listening to heavy metal, especially when she’s working, and is really into the Westerosi equivalent of late night comedy. Will get really invested in hobbies for like, a few months and then move on to something completely different. Is her grandfather Aerys’ favorite, and has him wrapped around her finger. Makes a game of antagonizing Viserys at Targ family functions, and has been inseparable from Margaery since they met in college. Thought her cousin Obara was the coolest person in the world when she was a kid. Most likely of all the characters to do a triathlon without breaking a nail.

Bran: Might be one sociology class away from identifying as an anarchist. Kind of wants to be a professor and will probably write novels someday. Is really into flea markets and will go antiquing with Ned and Elia and sometimes Cat. Loves kayaking and decorates his wheelchair elaborately for holidays. He’s won several costume contests at school for it. Very snarky. If Sansa had been raised by the starks, they would have had a standing Saturday lunch date to snark and gossip about the rest of the fam.

Jon: wanted to be a forest ranger for the longest time and then a writer, but felt like he had to choose a more reputable career, and is kind of jealous that Robb decided to say ‘fuck it’ and become an archaeologist. Really wants to travel, although he picked law after His Valyrian is passable (the targ sibs spoke it anytime they were with Rhaegar and fam), but he speaks Rhoynish fluently and is close to his cousins on the Martell side of the family. Really likes hiking and will often go with Cat, who is also fairly outdoorsy. Likes epic high fantasy novels and would really love LOTR.

Mya: is weirdly into dream interpretation, is bisexual, and has fallen into one of the canals in Braavos before on a school field trip. She was born in the Vale, and her mom moved to Braavos when she was five. Would definitely eat a bug on a dare. More tomboy than anything, but really enjoys getting dressed up and being feminine. Likes painting her nails fun colors. Who gives a shit about gender expectations? Not Mya.

Sansa: the first person she kisses in APWH isn’t going to be Jon…;) If she’d been raised by the Starks, she might have gone to school for journalism or become a novelist. Hates math, but is a passable accountant because of what Baelish taught her to help him with the books for his restaurants. Doesn’t like to ever wear her hair down, and has a collection of decorative bobby pins for updos that she’s acquired from flea markets in Braavos. Really loves to swim. Pushed the boy who knocked Mya into the canal in after her, but none of the teachers believe him when he accuses her, because it’s sweet, kind, well-behaved Sansa.

Robin: Secretly likes to listen to musicals and is a fairly good singer. In a group chat with Doree and Loree who are drastically improving his social skills and the three of them are parent-trap level plotting. Really dislikes doctors and hospitals. Used to ask Sansa to draw birds for him a lot when he was younger and still has most of them.

Rickon: is actually better with computers and smarter than anyone realizes, because he’s such a jock on the surface. Very used to going with the flow and adapting to change. His favorite classes are chemistry and bio, but he doesn’t really like writing. Is really popular and well-liked among his classmates, but can have a temper when he thinks an injustice is occurring. Is generally just good with animals.

Catelyn: Grew up going hunting with her uncle and always had a stronger stomach for it than Lysa and Edmure did. Is half-estranged from her father because of a disagreement they had regarding Catelyn’s inability to move on after the kidnapping, and a tense relationship with her brother after he married Roslyn Frey (The Freys were vocal supporters of Roose Bolton’s politics and had a hand in publicizing the rumors about the Starks being responsible for Sansa’s disappearance- Walder Frey owns several prominent southern newspapers), but they’re working on mending fences. Takes fairly long walks outside regularly, and would be a bruce springsteen fan. The most intimidating of the entire family.

Arya: Went through a true crime phase. Really enjoys learning languages, her favorite classes this past semester were her Ancient Ghiscari course and her global politics seminar, because they got to debate current issues every week. Like Sansa, she really likes people-watching. Will probably end up at the Olympics for fencing at some point, but was also a sprinter in high school on the track team.

Ned: Probably dropped acid at least once in college. Really enjoys skiing. Learned how to play the guitar as a part of his midlife crisis. Met Cat after she went on two dates with his brother Brandon and they decided they were better as friends. Brandon brought her to a party, and Ned ended up giving her a ride home after his brother found another girl to chat up. They quickly found out that they had a lot in common, and she got along famously with his mother, who Ned was extremely close to. Has a serious sweet tooth

Elia: Likes to paint, but doesn’t think she’s very good at it. Grew up speaking Rhoynish with her family, and taught it to the kids. Has forgotten more about art than most people will ever know, and is extremely efficient when set loose in a flea market. Really likes theater and ballet, and took ballet classes through college.

Lyanna: is working on a book about money in Westerosi politics that’s tied into her current investigation of the Boltons, but only Elia knows about it. Grew up far north, and her first language was the Old tongue rather than Andali, but didn’t want her kids picking it up, because the accent is stigmatized. Keeps notes for her articles in the Old Tongue to keep her nosy kids from reading them.

Theon: Is doing a psychiatry residency in King’s Landing currently. Does a fair amount of biking, and 100% does a polar bear swim in the ocean every winter (Aegon always shows up to cheer him on and they go out for drinks afterwards- his girlfriend, Jeyne, thinks this is insane). Refuses to eat blue foods and was actually a decent French horn player in high school.

Thank you- this was a fun one!! :)

You've been very critical of Cersei, especially in response to Tumblr often defending her in more ways than she probably should. In the same vein, do you think Daenerys is as bad or ambitious as Cersei? Are they meant to be parallels or foils?

I... don’t know if it’s like that for various reasons starting with the fact that cersei is a villain and dany is not and I think that what they have as parallels isn’t really where grrm means to go at, but I’ll try to give the most possible objective answer.

premise: dany is a character I really don’t care much either way about and I don’t remember 60% of her chapters (like, 90% of adwd and for the rest I only remember decently the got stuff and half of asos plus the vision at the end of acok) and I haven’t reread them in ages unless I needed to because a) she’s really not on my radar, b) that’s not the most engaging storyline to me so take my opinions for what they are.

that said:

I don’t think they’re nowhere near the same level because dany actually cares about other people which cersei does not;

also, there’s the angle where imvho dany wants the throne more because of her name/legacy/because viserys wanted it and she grew up with that toxic environment and she’s not actually moving forward bc basically she’s taken on herself what viserys wanted, but if you look at it... tbh I think dany just wants to get back to the house with the red door cuddling her lizards which is also why i think she’s not eventually getting the throne even if she won’t die at the end but that’s beyond the point, while everything cersei does is to get power and fuck everyone else in the way;

which is the other fundamental difference ie cersei doesn’t gaf about anyone else that’s not herself and doesn’t see people’s needs as something she needs to care about, while dany actually does care about other people - admittedly she gets caught up in selfrighteousness about that a lot for that but like... it’s not as if she freed the slaves for that, she really does believe in her cause/in helping others;

now, the thing they have in common imvho that I can see as a pseudo-parallel is that neither of them is actually good at ruling - or better, cersei is plain bad because she thinks that she’s her father and she’s not and she doesn’t listen to other people while dany has good intentions but doesn’t have one single adviser who’s actually trained for politics and is bad at seeing the great picture never mind diplomacy never mind that she hasn’t grasped the concept that you can’t just dismantle an entire established system with fire and blood even if it’s wrong (ie: everything that happens post-conquer of mereen is basically the realistic consequences of swooping in with dragons without looking at the entire situation around the place you’re supposed to conquer), which means that cersei’s stint at ruling and dany’s are both not good (and if adwd/affc had been one single book probably it would have been a more blatant parallel than it is with the books separated) so like... they could have been foils in that sense but if they had been in the same book it would have been more obvious but I mean... at worst it would have shown that dany isn’t a good ruler but means well while cersei isn’t a good ruler and.. well, means well for herself;

that said dany’s ambition, as stated before, is her brother’s ambition more than hers and it’s more about her birthright than what she actually wants, so i don’t think you can compare it with cersei’s because cersei again wants power for herself and like... she does want that;

I don’t think dany and cersei are even remotely on the same level morally because as stated dany cares about other people and cersei doesn’t;

also, you can dislike dany or not care, but... she’s written to be sympathetic, while cersei is not, in the sense that while you can find sympathetic someone the narrative doesn’t present as such and viceversa (for example with dany I’m not particularly interested so like... I care but I don’t relate to her nor feel anything that much specific except that I don’t dislike her but that’s it even if she’s written to be relatable/sympathetic while with cersei people see traits they find relatable/sympathetic so they empathize with her even if the narrative is very clear about how cersei is a negative character, which ofc is their prerogative bc everyone feels about characters in their own way), objectively dany is not coded negatively even if she has faults while cersei is coded negatively because she’s a villain and there’s nothing in her chapters that suggests that she’s going to change or that she wants to or that she would care for that, so ‘as bad as cersei’ is.... not correct because they’re nowhere near the same level when it comes to their personalities and they don’t act for the same reasons;

also: re cersei my problem is that people excuse everything she does on account of things that each single woman in these books has to deal with but somehow cersei is untouchable even when she’s done far worse than most other characters and without even taking dany into account (bc I think discourse on dany is extremely polarized in fandom and I don’t agree with either the FLAWLESS HERO side nor the OMG SHE’S THE VILLAIN side - I think she’s trying to do good but being a queen is not her life call and she’s there to deconstruct very specific tropes while being written sympathetically, so I’m like... not touching that, but people do criticize dany even if 80% of the time it’s not for reasons that are in the text but nvm), but like... if you objectively compare what catelyn has done textually and what cersei has done textually and see what fandom thinks of either in general it’s obvious that there is a strong double standard and I’m personally extremely tired of being classified as some kinda internalized misogynist because I don’t like cersei when people shit on catelyn for actual misogynistic reasons (because sorry but ‘she’s such a bitch she should have gone back home to her smaller children why did she even think she could help out robb’ when cat’s smarter than 90% of the other povs combined is a goddamned misogynist argument and guess what half of this fandom happily partakes in it to say one, and it’s not even the start of it). like, my issue with cersei is that people don’t discuss her critically nor accept that she’s a bad guy objectively - subjectively they can think whatever they want, but if you’re selling me your analysis as meta/STUFF THAT’S IN THE TEXT then it should be in the text and passing cersei as some feminist hero that is crushing the patriarchy is not what the text says;

I don’t have 99% of the same issues with dany bc as stated I don’t go there, idc about her and I disagree anyway with 98% of the takes I see concerning dany anyway but at least no one says that if you dislike dany you automatically don’t give a damn about women but that’s another problem;

but tldr the way dany is discussed in fandom is not the same cersei is discussed in fandom and I disagree with both discourses bc I think dany’s is too polarized in two opposite ways that don’t cover it imvho and cersei is polarized in one direction and that is my issue with cersei discourse basically;

I don’t think these two are comparable on a moral scale bc as stated dany has morals and cersei... doesn’t, on a narratively sympathy scale because grrm wants you to sympathize with dany at least to a level while not hiding that she has faults same as everyone in these books while cersei is written as a straight-up negative character that has possibly relatable reasons for being like that and which people can see themselves in, but she’s not meant to be someone the story sympathizes with - you’re meant to feel sorry for her at some point (I guess because I’m not the right person to ask that question) and you can absolutely find her relatable, but we’re not talking about people with the same set of morals, values and life targets anyway so tldr the answer is that at most they’re foils in the way grrm explores how they both fail at their first try at ruling (and for cersei most likely the last) but dany’s meant to be sympathetic, cersei isn’t;

I think they’re parallels in that sense but tbf I think that cersei has quiiite more foiling going on with cat in the sense of characters you contrast with each other who are starting from similar premises, and with dany I think it all begins and dies with their being queens but tbf I also don’t think it’s dany’s endgame and cersei is dying because she’s power-hungry so if dany lives renouncing it and cersei dies embracing it it’s definitely a foil for that, but like... they also aren’t directly connected by the narrative and I absolutely don’t think dany is younger and more beautiful which would actually connect them, idt they’re actually ever meeting, so... there is a parallel/foil but just on that one aspect. for the rest they’re wildly different imvho.

... I hope it made sense. XD

to be honest, only paid reviewers can defend this sh*t. there is an article on VF already saying that the twins got what they deserved - it's like they know people are going to go insane, it's like they have noticed that no, Jaime's arc hasn't fooled anybody, and they're spreading a narrative that tries to make sense of what is the worst character assassination ever. too bad that the rest of the episode is so incredibly terrible that they are never going to pull this off. tbh it's beyond me to

understand why, though. why do this? why destroy everything this way? the only answer I have is that D&D are sociopaths. there is no other explanation.

I think GRRM’s ending is going to be in some ways rather bleak as well but I bet he gave it to them without context at all and D&D were entirely incapable of connecting all the dots before the end themselves so they went for shock for shock’s sake. 

Those saying that we could see it all along just exploit Jaime’s character assassination to prove they were right for not liking Jaime or not liking Braime. Also, the comparison between Dany and Jaime is bullshit. In my opinion, the episode was not *entirely* terrible. Many characters’ choices subverted expectations and some were good just as some were bad. 

Varys’ treason is bad because even though it is well intended, it is incredibly stupid. Varys is one of the cleverest characters and yet he basically starts screaming around the he is against the Mad Queen he serves. Instead of conspiring for her death, putting some fucking poison in her drink, he essentially commits suicide. Varys would never easily risk his head just like that. 

Tyrion’s plot twist was good. Most of us love Tyrion  and initially it was painful for me to see him betray Varys, his old friend. It makes sense to me now though. Tyrion was terrified for his life and Varys had made the stupid decision to go public about his betrayal. Tyrion was the one who told Varys so if Tyrion didn’t betray him to Dany, then Varys would still die and Tyrion would follow him. Let alone Jon would probably do too. Tyrion went for damage control even though it pained him. 

Greyworm’s sudden outrage was the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen. Greyworm has been portrayed to have a strong moral code despite being an Unsullied. Okay, yeah, they beheaded Missandei but could this justify the once extremely stoic Greyworm lashing out and killing soldiers that have yielded and innocents? Greyworm had a sense of justice once - he should have turned against his queen. And even if he lost control, Jon’s commands should have been enough to bring him to his senses. 

Arya and Jon Snow - lol plot twist, most pointless characters ever but I don’t care and then we have Davos, who - let me be clear - I freaking love and he’ll survive the show without doing anything and fighting even for a mere second. Davos for the throne and I’m not even kidding. 

Cersei - believe it or not, I didn’t mind that. I always have (or had) a soft spot for the Lannisters. (And the show is going to obliterate all of them - ain’t that great.) To me, the way Cersei and Jaime died was almost funny - suddenly portrayed as the tragic lovers lol what. However, aside from everything that had to do with Jaime, I didn’t mind her being portrayed as the victim. Cersei was not a good person but also she had a cruel life. She knew since she was a kid that all her children would die and that her brother would kill her. How easily can you be sane and loving if you know that this is going to be your future? I don’t hate Cersei. When a person loses everything, it is then normal to let go of all their defenses and start crying and begging for survival. I appreciated that, for once, she cared about Jaime’s wounds. In a way, Cersei lost most of her sanity out of losing everything she loved. I think the point of the story there was that no matter how terrible Cersei was, she wasn’t AS bad as Daenerys. Cersei killed guilty and innocents to achieve certain goals. She destroyed the Sept where the Sparrows were (who were indeed a plague for the city) and along with them the Tyrells who she hated and probably all the people who ‘d gone there to see the Queen getting condemned. Essentially, most people in the Sept were her enemies or dangerous for the city and the kingdom. I doubt Cersei would just wake up one day and decide to burn an entire city. She didn’t care for her people, she used their lives for leverage but she wouldn’t harm them just for pleasure either. Yes, Cersei was an evil dangerous woman and deserved to die but she wasn’t the worst in that dark world. She wasn’t Joffrey (although she made him, she was always better than him), she wasn’t Ramsey and, in the end, she wasn’t Dany.

Now, Dany and Jaime. Here’s the big difference - Dany and Jaime’s character arcs are the exact opposite. Dany has been giving signs of cruelty which start really subtle but progressively get worse and worse. She starts by giving no shit for Viserys literally melting before her eyes and we excuse her because he was abusing her. Then she kills all the masters in brutal ways, supposedly to fight slavery. She starts listening to her subjects less and less. As the seasons proceed she burns people, even for not kneeling. Do you know why Daenerys hadn’t gone full villain earlier? Because of Jorah and Ser Barristan. Those two noble and genuinely good guys who cared about her were able to keep her sane and advice her properly. Tyrion and Varys can’t control her that well and her true inclination starts showing clearly the moment they take over. Jon is the last one that with his noble and selfless intentions manages to guide her until he stupidly tells her the truth and that’s the last straw for her fragile mentality.

Jaime’s arc is the exact opposite. Unlike Dany, he progressively gets better and better as the seasons proceed. We reach the half of the last season and Jaime is now the best man one could be - loving, brave, selfless, honourable and, well, completely indifferent and over his manipulative hateful sister. And yet. In 5 minutes, all of it is thrown in the garbage. In a hilarious way. Seriously, last week I was crying. This week I’m laughing. 

 I will say, though, something I also said last week. This kind of turn in Jaime’s character was not meant to show that Jaime after all was still bad or depraved or hateful. He never was any of this, not really. He never meant to fuck Brienne and leave and his appreciation, respect and attraction to Brienne was not a lie. The point was that even though he was a good man, Jaime was stupid. The stupidest Lannister indeed. Also, always entirely incapable of taking initiative and make his own choices without having someone to guide him and tell him what to do, for good or bad. This part of his character has been fairly consistent. That’s the saddest thing of all. 

Hi love! with so much speculation about Jon Snow taking the Iron Throne, what are the steps he would need to take in order to be King? Is there any scenario where it would be possible without Daenery's support? Thanks!

anon asked:

What are your thoughts on people claiming Jon has a better claim to the iron throne than Dany? If this was a war of succession, then he would… but it’s a war of conquest. Whoever wins gets the crown, not whoever deserves it more.

Answering both of you at once since they’re variations of the same question. First of all, Jon only has a better claim to the throne than Dany if he is legitimate,* if Rhaegar and Lyanna were married and if it was a legitimate marriage. Despite what the show did, neither of those two things may be true in the books. And I presume both of you know better than to ask me about the show.

*This is not counting the facts of Aerys’s disinheritance of Rhaegar’s children in favor of Viserys (who later claimed Dany as his heir), or the whole issue of the precedent against women having any claim to the throne, which Elio says may not apply anyway. Succession is complicated.

Nevertheless, whether Jon has a better claim to the throne or not… well… second of all, Jon has to want the Iron Throne, has to want to rule Westeros, and has to want to fight for it. I genuinely can’t think of any reason the Jon we know would want any of that. (The Jon that comes back from the dead may not exactly be the Jon we know, though.) I have a very hard time thinking of Jon, raised as a Stark (bastard), believing Ned was his father, desperately wanting to be thought of as a true Stark, to deny that part of himself so much that he rejects it entirely in favor of fighting to be a Targaryen instead. Honestly, the only reason I could see him (the Jon I know at least) doing that would be altruistically: to step out of the way of his Stark siblings/cousins’ right to Winterfell, or because he’s acclaimed (the people really want him to be king and he can’t deny them), or because he genuinely thinks he’s the only/best one left to lead Westeros’s rebuilding after the apocalypse. (But then I don’t always expect him to survive the apocalypse; and if he does I figure he’ll be a co-ruler anyway.)

So. If Jon did want to take the Iron Throne as sole ruler (or king with a mere queen consort rather than co-regent), and if he were looking to be acclaimed by those invested in the continuity of the Targaryen dynasty (as opposed to just right of conquest, by which anyone can grab anything really if they beat up everybody else trying for it), what would he need to do?

He would need to prove his legitimacy. Documents (of marriage, of annulment if applicable), witnesses. (Visions of the past are probably not legally admissible.)

He would need support, those lords who would be acclaiming him. Probably a good majority of the Great Lords of Westeros. (The outcomes of the Great Councils were far more than a supermajority, apparently.) Robert was acclaimed by 3 Great Lords (Stark, Arryn, Tully; 4 if you count himself) as well as most of their bannermen at the Trident, and after the Trident by another (Greyjoy) and after the Sack by another (Lannister), and then 2 more (Tyrell, Martell) eventually submitted to him. Jon would need something similar, as would anyone trying to take the throne. Bend the knee, bitches.

In order to get this support, force of arms is really helpful to encourage the lords to kneel with their decisions. A dragon or three, say, a couple of armies.

Would Dany’s support be important? Well, her disagreement could really fuck things up, so heck yeah she’s important. (A scenario where she would not be important is if she’s died or for some reason never comes to Westeros.**) Consider Young Griff/Aegon, and the question of whether he’s legitimate or a pretender – he was supposed to go to Dany to tell her who he was and ask her to marry him, since she was a well-known true and legitimate Targaryen, and her support and approval of his status would win over those doubting lords of Westeros. And her dragons, too. (Note Tyrion convinced Aegon that he could conquer first and win Dany later with his conquering as a bride-gift, but we’ll have to see how that works out.) If Dany is giving a dragon to Jon, as well as an army or two, that is also extremely helpful support.

After all this, Jon would need to be anointed by the High Septon to really get all the people on his side. Sure, he could crown himself (as Aegon the Conqueror initially did), but the Faith of the Seven is still the most popular religion in Westeros and Aegon counted his rule from the day the High Septon crowned and anointed him in Oldtown. Difficulties: Jon worships the Old Gods only; Jon may be resurrected by R’hllor, a foreign god the Faith considers demonic (Jon coming back from the dead at all is kinda creepy lbr); and of course the above questions of legitimacy etc. Another major difficulty: between KL possibly blowing up and Oldtown also likely coming under sorcerous fire, will there even be a High Septon after the apocalypse? Well, if needs be, anointing can wait.

**Another potential scenario where Dany’s support is not important would be a wild AU where Ned Stark doesn’t promise Lyanna to keep Jon safe and secret and unknowing of his heritage, and instead ambitiously makes himself a kingmaker. This would require Ned to be a completely different person as well as his relationship with Robert to be completely different (never any friendship to begin with? a break caused by the Sack that is never healed?), as well as a completely different history that’s not ASOIAF, but presumably neither Dany or Viserys (young, exiled, without friends) would be that necessary for Ned to make Jon a king should he so wish.

I think that covers most of the issues and required steps. Any further questions, just let me know.

Daenerys: a conqueror with dragons or just another mad Targaryen ruler?

I’m so angry right now and I have to say something.

It’s perfectly fine to write a character that starts out with good intentions and goes bad, or to have a character go mad due to anger and extreme grief, because that happens in real life, horrible circumstances can shape people with the best intentions, you can have good people slip, but you have to do it right. What happened to Daenerys is just stupid writing.

(I’m only talking about the arc of Daenerys in the TV show and not in the books)

Was she was mad all along? Was her madness was foreshadowed? uhmm, no. When Daenerys gained power, burned people, did questionable and even bad things to reach her goal, to pursue her ideology of justice, to end oppression no matter the consequences, without thinking things through, because she was a person who has been stripped of her rights, whose family was murdered, whose father was mad and most likely abusive, a person who was abused by her only living family, sold into marriage, Daenerys, a person who suffered immensely because of other people who abused their positions of power as rulers, as men, and so doesn’t want other people to suffer like she did, doesn’t want other people to be oppressed like she was, that is not foreshadowing for madness, it’s just writing a complex character, and most importantly, writing a conqueror.

Game of Thrones is all about power and how people gain power and use it. It is also about how power affects people and changes people, and it shows that the best people to wield power aren’t the heroes who are glorified in stories, the good, pure-hearted saviours. No. In GoT it’s clear that power is wielded best by people who are willing to get dirty, who are willing to do morally ambiguous things, to sacfrifice their goodness and morality for their scope, people who are shrewd. This was established when Ned Stark died. The world of GoT is too cruel for people who are only good and innocent, and so to make a difference you have to be tough, you have to do bad things sometimes, you have to get dirty to kill your enemies, if you take the moral highground, you lose. If you put your morality above your survival, you die.

What GoT also does is utilize character flaws to people’s advantage. Some flaws that are usually seen as selfish and bad, like extreme ambition, stubbornness, cruelty, help the characters survive. Some characters slowly lose their humanity while doing these bad things, some are better at keeping true to themselves  while doing horrible but necessary things, but everyone who survives loses their innocence. EVERYONE. (Name me one character who is alive now in GoT and has remained completely innocent).

Daenerys is a conqueror, this is how she gains power. She is from a powerful, wealthy family who has established their power by conquering, a family who had magical skills and fucking DRAGONS. So yeah, she acts entitled. VERY. Not only has she the set up of a conqueror: power, fame, great following because of family history, she also has the skills of a conqueror: she is well educated, she is determined, is a natural leader, is magically gifted and seems special in a lot of ways,  and all of this is done beautifully because of her character development: she is from a great family and her inner skills (magical powers, visions)  make her prone to a prophetic destiny, but she can’t tap into her powers and use them properly because she is thinks she is weak, she has suffered tragedy and then treated poorly by her brother and groomed to be a tool in his plan, she has been neglected beacause she wasn’t the heir to the throne, she was sheltered and kept in isolation so she had no experience of the real world, she had no reason to believe in herself, she was underdeveloped as a person fit to rule. But when she leaves Viserys’s grip, she starts to grow, to mature, to learn,  she becomes strong and fierce and stands up to Viserys, and starts believing in herself. She discovers that she has immense power, I mean fire can’t burn her wth. And this gush of power, the revenge she has on Viserys, the fact that she loses her child because of her mistake, the guilt, the responsibility, these things kill the child Daenerys, kill her innocence and give her a taste of her own power, of the person she could be, and then the birth of the dragons give her the confirmation she needs that maybe she is destined to be a great ruler, that she can change lives and she becomes set on the fact that the iron throne is something that is now not only her birth right because Viserys is dead, but something she deserves, maybe something she was born for … and it makes sense because Daenerys comes into power by standing up for herself and taking actions against the people who harmed her, and who has harmed her family the most, who left two young Targaryen children to suffer trauma and shoulder the responsibility of a great dynasty, if not the people who murdered her family and took the iron throne?

And so this young girl who has been powerless and scared comes into a lot of power (dragons, magic skills) at the same time she stands up to her abusers and gets revenge, so yeah, that goes to her head. Power is intoxicating and her transformation is fast and shapes her personality drastically. She doesn’t want to feel weak again, she doesn’t want bad things to happen to her again, so she wants to use her power to go home, a place that would make her feel safe, and also a place that is now hers by right and by divine agency (the magic, the dragons); the ruler of the seven kindoms is a position of power so high that she thinks no one would harm her there, no one would abuse her; she associates power and strength and toughness with safety because these things save her from Viserys, save her  from her demise as a Khaleesi, these things help her avenge her son, these things save her from feeling worthless and sad and without purpose and make her feel in control.

But she is also a kind person. So she doesn’t want other people to suffer like she did. And power gives her the means to help other people and influence their lives. She has been oppressed so she hates oppression, she hates people abusing their power, she hates people making others suffer for no reason, she has decided that she will no longer suffer and be helpless, and so her newly accumulated power lets her take her ideas of justice and protection to the extreme: she will not have other people suffer needlessly, she will punish those who harm the weak.

And now she is ready to become the character that she was meant to be in the story: a conqueror with a great backstory, a conqueror with and ideology shaped by her life experience and backed by her inner strengths and qualities. And so she has the qualities of a conqueror with her heritage, skills and motivations: she is extremely ambitious, sticks to her goal no matter what, does not compromise, is arrogant, is entitled, feels destined, does bad and cruel things to achieve her goal, doesn’t accept weakness, insubordination, etc. I have seen some even say that she is meant to be a tyrant (we have to remeber tho that a tyrant doesn’t care about their people at all but Daenerys cares a lot), because she makes everyone follow her ideology and forces them to live by her rules, and yeah, I think that is true; she does exactly that; but the difference is that her tyranny isn’t all bad. Her tyranny is for the greater good.

And I know that is exactly how tyrants justify their rule but hear me out. Daenerys rules with an iron fist because she wants to achieve her goal, which is justice and freeing people from useless suffering. And remember, she is not a politician, she is not a diplomat, she is a conqueror, so she doesn’t know the subtleties of ruling, she doesn’t know how good intentions can have bad consequences,  she is straightforward, she wants justice and the only way to get it fast is to have complete control over society, to be a dicator of sorts, a Caesar. No middle men (she also doesn’t trust people easily, makes sense), no corrupt politicians, no years of changes, just hard rules and hard consequences for people who don’t follow them. Obviously this is problematic and things do not go smoothly, as the time she spends in Meeren and Yunkai shows. But her dictatorial ideology isn’t entierly bad, even if it wasn’t justified by her conqueror status and her personality. To make changes in society is very hard, almost impossible. Because people are used to comfort and are willing to overlook bad things for the sake of their own well-being, even when bigger things are at stake. So in order to change bad habbits in a society you need a tough ruler. A ruler who disregards people’s likings, who makes people live in hard conditions for the greater good and doesn’t care if people accept them or not. You need a tough regime. For example, in order to combat climate change, society needs to implement very strict regulations, regulations which people don’t like and don’t agree with and will never accept unless forced to. Society would need a regime or ruler who doesn’t accept insubordination, who makes sure that everyone follows the rules to save the planet, a person to manage resources properly even if it costs people their comfort, their belongings and their former way of life. And with climate change, you can’t really take things slowly, one step at the time, because there isn’t enough time. This example is a bit extreme but you get the point.

Slavery in Slaver’s Bay was bad for people and society in general, but the people in power were okay with it because they were the ones profiting from it, and the slaves couldn’t to anything because they were indoctrinated into thinking that they had to live like that, that that was their place in the world and had no power. And so when they rebel and a new society emerges, Daenerys has no choice but to rule with an iron fist because otherwise everything would go back to the way it was, which happens in Astapor and Yunkai eventually, after she leaves. If she wants to protect her ideology and all the people, she needs to be a dictator, there are no compromises here, she needs to punish people who don’t follow the rules, otherwise it would all descent into chaos; so she brings this great change for the greater good, and eventually it doesn’t work because she can’t commit to being this dictator. Her arc in Slaver’s Bay shows her struggling with being a just ruler and a kind person, with being wise and making smart decisions to consolidate her rule and maintaing her ideology of justice. And she does “bad” things to maintain her ideology (crucifies the masters, kills a former slave who slays his master ) but also compromises her ideology (accepts to marry Hizdahr) for the good of society. Because unlike when she punished her abusers or people who did bad things to her, in Slaver’s Bay her quest for power and ideology don’t align. Being just doesn’t mean always being kind, being the ruler with the most power doesn’t mean you are safe and can solve everything, people aren’t just good or bad and can’t be judged so easily, a person who was abused can abuse someone else, etc.

Despite her having so much power she could just burn anyone who disobeys her (be an actual tyrant basically), which would, from a standpoint, solve some of her problems, she decides to try and be good ruler, to learn how to put the good of society before her ideology of justice, even if this ideology is what drives her and her intentions. She learns how to be a politician.

But at her core she isn’t. At her core she is a conqueror. What she does best is gain power and lead. She isn’t good at the subtleties of politics even though she learns many things. That’s why she slips. Because she tries to do the right thing, her kindness and ideology ultimately make her discard that same ideology, make her put her goal second to the good of other people. Because that is what seems a good ruler does, that is what some people tell her a good ruler does, that is what a kind person does. But as I said before in GoT people who start putting their morality first have less chances of surviving the game. Anyways.

The point is, finally, that Daenerys has shown no signs of madness throught the 7 seasons. She is scary, arrogant, a true powerful leader, but not mad. Where is the madness? She has the arc of a conqueror and so the qualities of a conqueror, with great backstory. Real life characters that I find Daenerys having similarities with are Caesar and Alexander the Great, and in GoT, Tywin Lannister, who did a lot of bad things, had a quick rise to power, was tough, arrogant, scary, entitled, etc. and isn’t mad at all.

So no madness up until season 8. And going mad is an option for her character still even if she had no obvious signs before. Because yeah, she has been through a lot of shit and she has been growing impatient to get the throne and she feels that if she doesn’t get it all of her growth has been in vain, all her suffering has been for nothing. She is the person she is now because of her ideology and because of her goal, which have kept her going, and so she has to have it. And the grief of losing 2 of her Dragons, who are like her children btw and so it’s fuckin horrible, losing Missandei, her closest friend, losing a lot of her army, which she considers to be her people, becoming jealous of Jon because people prefer him as a leader because they know and trust him and not her, the rightful ruler but a foreigner, and then finding out that the basis of her growth and the reason for her struggle was a lie, that she wasn’t the rightful ruler after all, that she fought in vain, yeaaah boiiiii this could fuck up anyone. So slipping does make sense at this point.

But for her go crazy and burn innocent people out of nowhere makes no sense. This has no set up AT ALL. If she were to get consumed by hatred she would have went for her enemies and her allies, maybe go in a fit of rage when finding out that Jon betrayed her, or Tyrion, and try to kill them, or burn the Red Keep to kill Cersei and also kill innocents ( ending suggested here: https://snowstcrm.tumblr.com/post/184852413126/daenerys-story-isnt-a-greek-tragedy-its-just-a ), or doing anything in a fit of rage which at this point is justified, she would not go for innocent people, NOT JUST FOR THE SAKE OF IT, NOT JUST BECAUSE, maybe have her kill innocent people standing in her way to get to Cersei, the people in the Red Keep or something, and afterwards make her realise what she has done without realising and that she has truly corrupted her purpose, and make her consumed with guilt, that would truly drive her mad because she is such a kind person but ruthless to people who misuse power, and in this case it would have been her who had used her power in a horrible way. The thing she has in the show is just a fit of rage, a justified fit at that, and she has always ALWAYS directed her rage at people who have harmed her or others, she has never hurt the innocent if she could help it, this isn’t how you go mad. THIS IS ANGER AND GRIEF. You don’t lose your mind all at once like that. And lets say she just loses it for a bit and can’t control herself, why the fuck would she burn innocent people when the only thing she has left at this point, the only thing that keeps her going is to get the iron throne, she has lost everything, and only has the throne left, and what the throne means for her and has meant for her all these years is protection for her and the people of the seven kingdoms, and to just go for them like that means killing her own purpose and the only thing she has left. And again, were she to lose it or just have a fit of rage, she would have gone for her allies and people who betrayed her or Cersei, even if burning her ancestor’s home would make no sense for her at this point either way. I mean in the past she chained two of her dragons, HER CHILDREN, underground just because her other dragon burned a child she has never known, this is the length she was willing to go to protect the people and protect justice,  are we supposed to have forgotten this,  are we supposed to believe that this is the same character? This was so poorly handled I CAN’T EVEN

If they wanted to have Drogon burn Kings Landing and her army sack it then they should’ve done a proper fight ,a siege, that would’ve made a bit more sense, Cersei wouldn’t have surrenedered either way. In the last episode those arrows are a big thing, they kill Rhaegal, they’re the reason why Dany doesn’t save Missandei, and they they just go out in minutes now? there are tens of arrows there on the walls and on the ships, and none of them presents even the slightest challenge for Drogon and Dany, even thogh they had her running for it in the last episode? 

Or why didn’t they have Daenerys lose it when Missandei dies in front of her if thats what they wanted to go for? That would’ve made sense, why make her seem mad out of nowhere or just plain cruel without any consistency with her previous actions and decisions whyyyyy this is so stupiddddd 

When she burns Mirri Maz Duur, it’s because she lied to her and that’s what killed her child. She burned the House of the Undying because they wanted to keep her there. She burned Astapor to free the slaves. She burned the khals to escape and get an army of Dothraki riders. She burned the Tarlys because they wouldn’t bend the knee (this wasn’t consistent with her character either tbh - if this was supposed to be her abusing her power it was just bad writing). These burnings were not madness or killings for the sake of killing but calculated actions to get revenge, protect herself and gain power.

And before I fucking go, the show praising Sansa for knowing ‘what Dany is made of’ and not trusting her, this is how you manipulate people to buy into bad writing. Sansa is a great character but so is Dany, and because the show wanted to have Dany go mad and have Sansa call her out doesn’t make Sansa a better character, she already is a great character and it is just bad writing again. It makes sense for Sansa not to trust her and not to want her on the throne, her family was murdered by Targaryens, Dany is a foreigner and she also wants the North to be independent, so they didn’t have to emphasise so much on the Stark kids foreshadowing her going evil and crazy because she isn’t mad or evil, it’s common sense not to trust a foreigner with so much power. Even if she did save them with her army and dragons. (I’m not talking about the actual words they say but just the way they generally talk about Dany with suspicion, the way the Dany and Sansa scenes are written and filmed with a lot of tension, the way they’re extreme mistrust of her isn’t justified, she has done nothing to earn that level of mistrust except being a Targaryen ruler who wants to claim the throne).

Oh and, for the comparisons with the mad king: his state of mind degenerated over a long period of time, he would spend most of his time alone, he became paranoid, became obssessed with wildfire, had no concern for his people, he enjoyed killing and being cruel, and started hearing voices. This how you go mad (in this story at least). Did Danny go through any of this or anything remotely similar until 8.05??

IN CONLUSION, Daenerys Targaryen is a ruthless, fierce, strong, arrogant, sometimes insecure, kind, just, ambitious woman, a true leader, who wants to make the world a better place, a complex character with a lot of flaws who makes bad decisions, who had no set up to be mad, only to be a conqueror, who could’ve gone mad and it would’ve made sense for her character but this isn’t what the past seasons have been about, who could’ve just slipped in season 8 but the way they did it made no fuckin sense. 

And this has nothing to do with people liking Daenerys as a character or not, or Daenerys being good person or not or if she deserves the throne or not, her going mad like this isn’t consistent with her character development WHICH THEY WROTE; 

So who ever thought of this shit, fuck you. You destroyed a perfectly interesting character who had a lot of thought put into her, I mean you had a go at her anyway in the past seasons, but this just ruined the show, ruined everything this show has been about. 

This is just bad writing and plot devices and going for shock value, and it shows because she isn’t the only character getting this treatment, the show has ruined plenty of interesting charactes, the most obvious one being Bran GOODBYE

Why do people want Jon to be legitimate so bad? It's almost like they're buying into the stigma that being a bastard is bad and something to fix. And like you said, it's as simple as Rhaegar was married, Lyanna betrothed, and polygamy illegal. He's a bastard. And I really doubt Lyanna would be so naive (well her running away in itself is naive but different context imo) as to believe 'marrying' Rhaegar before her gods would somehow be noble or recognized.

Oh man. I have THINGS TO SAY.

For many people, I think he’s just a special snowflake and they want him to be legitimate so that he’s not “tainted” by bastardy or whatever and he gets to have Everything He’s Always Wanted™.

But also, I think it’s for how much of an identity crisis Jon has had with being a bastard and the irony that this scenario would bring to it. We’re inside Jon’s head so thoroughly and thus are keenly aware of how for his entire life he’s been at odds with his status, especially since he’s not the typical bastard. Catelyn is frigid towards him not because he’s illegitimate, but because Ned brought him home and has raised him alongside Robb, completely ignoring the shame it brings upon his wife.

Yet, Jon’s not the same as Robb — he has the same basic education, but he’s never been in line for Winterfell and by virtue of his very birth there was always an insurmountable divide between him and his siblings. Except for as much as Jon dislikes his place, he abides by it well — even when he’s presented with what he used to dream of (though note it says “later, when he was older, he had been ashamed of those dreams … even to dream otherwise seemed disloyal”), to become an actual Stark, he refuses it because he knows it would be a farce and that Winterfell belongs to Sansa, not him.

It stems too from him having no idea who his mother was. Obviously Ned can’t tell him the truth, but he doesn’t even tell him a lie. Was his mother a whore? A merchant’s daughter? Ashara Dayne? Wylla? Who was she? Jon (understandably) desperately wants her to be a respectable woman, but he’s told absolutely nothing about her so even that is merely a hope.

“Words won’t make your mother a whore. She was what she was, and nothing Toad says can change that. You know, we have men on the Wall whose mothers were whores.”

Not my mother, Jon thought stubbornly. He knew nothing of his mother; Eddard Stark would not talk of her. Yet he dreamed of her at times, so often that he could almost see her face. In his dreams, she was beautiful, and highborn, and her eyes were kind.

The sad thing here is that we know Jon’s mother was beautiful, highborn, and kind, but Jon doesn’t. And he thinks of this constantly:

I will ask him about my mother, he resolved. I am a man now, it is past time he told me. Even if she was a whore, I don’t care, I want to know.

He wanted to say that Lord Eddard would never dishonor himself, not even for love, yet inside a small sly voice whispered, He fathered a bastard, where was the honor in that? And your mother, what of his duty to her, he will not even say her name.

Interestingly, his mentions of her fade as the series goes on, as he accepts who he is. He didn’t have any friends in Winterfell save (most of) his family, yet at the Wall he’s surrounded by people he considers not only friends, but brothers. Who actually like him. Then, where once he had thought he could never achieve any high position, he is elected Lord Commander. Sure, that command is of the Night’s Watch and not Winterfell, but the position has been held by many respectable men, and no one ranks higher than he does. He is in charge. People listen to him.

Enter that irony. For five books we have Jon slowly growing into himself, finding love (even if it’s dubious consent love) and friendship and honor and repute despite being a bastard, then we find out his parents were not only married but his mother was a Stark and his father was the Targaryen crown prince. If circumstances were different, Jon would have grown up as third in line to the Iron Throne behind Rhaegar and Aegon. But that could only happen if Rhaegar and Lyanna were married, 100% legally, and if they could prove it and/or anyone actually believed them — it’s not enough that they simply had him, because then he could only ever be a legitimized bastard, who may have come before the girls in succession, we don’t really have precedent to say, but may equally have come dead last after Aegon, Viserys, Rhaenys, and Dany (possibly even Rhaella?).

They also focus on the Prince That Was Promised prophecy, and claim that he must be legitimate because then that title wouldn’t fit. This despite the fact that Dany is likely the “Prince” That Was Promised — 

“No one ever looked for a girl,” [Aemon] said. “It was a prince that was promised, not a princess. … Dragons are neither male nor female, Barth saw the truth of that, but now one and now the other, as changeable as flame. The language misled us all for a thousand years. Daenerys is the one, born amidst salt and smoke. The dragons prove it.”

— and that Jon would still have princely blood even if he were a bastard. Both because Rhaegar lived and died as one, and because if everyone had lived and Jon were legitimized, he would then also be a prince, though not trueborn.

And we mustn’t forget that much of this bullshit has to do with people’s perceptions of Elia as well. Everyone and their grandmother says she would have been fine with it because she’s ~Dornish~ and Dornish people take ~paramours~ and so she wouldn’t care.

Never mind that the last time a Martell married a Targaryen, a Targaryen bastard set off five generations of war, the last of which occurred right on Elia’s doorstep and in which (probably) her uncle Lewyn earned his stripes.

Never mind that Rhaegar was not Dornish and by using the “paramour” excuse he would be disgustingly appropriating a culture to which he doesn’t belong.

Never mind that Rhaegar fathering a bastard, even an un-legitimized one, would present an extreme threat to Elia’s children. She’s Dornish, people are racist as hell towards her people (not to mention ableist towards her specifically), and love the Starks — what happens if Westeros decides one day they’re not into having a half-Dornish king and instead back Jon? What happens if Lyanna isn’t content with her son playing second fiddle?

What happens if Rhaegar decides Jon is a better choice, especially if he changes his mind about Aegon having the song of ice and fire, and either sets Aegon and Rhaenys aside or declares Jon his heir over Aegon? Brandon was betrothed to a Tully, Ned was warded with Robert in the Vale, and Tywin hated Aerys — that’s a ridiculously powerful bloc that could oppose Elia’s children, who would have only Dorne and maybe a handful of other houses in support.

Elia would never be on board with that. I could see her putting up with Rhaegar having a mistress, because almost every guy in this series has one, but not a highborn one, and not having a child on one. And the way he went about it? By abandoning a newly postpartum Elia who nearly died giving birth to an heir who looked exactly like him, running off with the 15-year-old only daughter of a Lord Paramount, not leaving so much as a note or letting Lyanna tell her family she’s all right, disappearing for over a year, not returning even when Brandon and Rickard were killed or when war broke out or when his wife and children were taken hostage, then being so overconfident about winning on the Trident that he lost in gruesome fashion.

He caused not only the downfall of his own house, but crippled the Starks (Brandon, Rickard, and Lyanna all die, then Benjen takes the black shortly after the war) and the Dornish (10,000 spears were extorted from Doran, Elia was raped and murdered, their children were brutally killed, Lewyn was killed in battle, Arthur was killed, and Ashara committed suicide), put the Baratheons and Lannisters in power, and ruined the prophecy as he’d interpreted it.

Had Rhaegar not been so politically braindead, none of that would have happened. So no, Elia would have hated him for that, not signed off on it. Fuck that noise. People often talk about paramours as though every Dornish person takes one and that it’s not cheating, which is simply not true. Oberyn had one, but Oberyn was not married, the occasional additional liaisons he took were not only approved by Ellaria, but they participated in those liaisons together, and he and Ellaria were in a committed relationship for 14-plus years. 

We also really don’t have that many examples of Dornish people taking paramours at all:

Ellaria

Neither she nor Oberyn were married, and they were both completely devoted and faithful to one another.

Old Lord Yronwood’s that Oberyn slept with

Which, incidentally, we don’t know that Yronwood was cheating at all. Perhaps Yronwood was a widower, or his wife was fine with it, or his wife joined in, we don’t know the details.

Lewyn

Hey guess what! He wasn’t married, and was completely faithful to her, exactly like Oberyn.

Daemon Sand

There were rumors that he and Oberyn were lovers (which, gross, on so many levels), but we have only the one mention and no proof. Arianne maybe counts here as well, depending on your definition.

Drinkwater twins

Cletus suggested Quentyn take one of them as a paramour after he was married, but again we don’t know the details of that hypothetical, and Quentyn rejected it anyway.

Many Dornishmen took women of the Rhoynar for paramours; however, presumably that would have been more for purposes of alliance and to permanently join the two races.

Sylvenna Sand

She was a whore in King’s Landing who was the paramour of Essie, who was also a whore, so yet again, no adultery there.

Now, the text often refers to mistresses as paramours, but they are used interchangeably outside of Dorne. Within Dorne, they’re a separate thing. And, as you can see from the above, no one except maybe Lord Yronwood was married.

Rhaegar was. With two small children. Lyanna was betrothed. Their affair was full-blown adultery, none of this “paramour” business. Once more I say: fuck that noise.

Also, like … GRRM once said Rhaegar was a “lovestruck prince” and Barristan said he��“loved his lady Lyanna” (neither sentiment is one I believe), but we’re never told anything of Lyanna’s thoughts on the matter. I am baffled as to where people get the idea she would agree to a marriage with Rhaegar.

She wanted out of her betrothal to Robert because he was not faithful, why would she enter into polygamy?? Why would she agree to get pregnant at 15?? She’s compared to Arya constantly — can you see Arya ever doing all of that?? It makes no sense!

Not that they could even get married. The Faith prohibits polygamy, and we have no examples of people in the North (save beyond the Wall, which is not in the Seven Kingdoms) ever having polygamous marriages either. So even if there were some kind of “ceremony,” it would never hold up.

Anyway. People are dumb.

It really sucks how judgmental you and some people in this fandom are of anyone who doesn't interpret the text the same way as you or who you deem as intellectually inferior to you. I agree with so many of your ideas about the characters, but I hate how high and mighty you are about those ideas. Someone isn't an idiot if they interpret Jon or Cersei differently than you.

......

lmao

okay anon, thing is: one thing is being high and mighty, one thing is telling you that you’re not reading the text.

like. I read yesterday someone being like ‘omg I read someone dared saying C. abused people and murdered someone before puberty HOW STUPID CAN PEOPLE BE’. it’s textual evidence that a) she molested tyrion sexually and that’s even without taking account my opinion re lann*ncest, b) that SHE KILLED MELARA WHEN THEY WERE TWELVE THROWING THE POOR GIRL DOWN A WELL, which means that whoever said it cannot fucking read the text because it’s black on white that she did both those things and refusing to accept it is Not Reading The Text. that’s not even text interpretation, that’s basic textual reading.

now: never mind cersei who gets a pass for about every fucking shit she pulls because she’s a woman, and don’t tell me she doesn’t because if she got as much shit about robert’s fifteen bastards that she ordered dead without even blinking as theon got for two kids that he’s felt guilty about since it happened then we could discuss it but she doesn’t and that’s not even the beginning of it. now: do you see me tagging my opinions? like, honestly, if I think something shitty about cersei, do you see me tagging it? I didn’t even tag the one time I ranted about the valonqar prophecy with her, I only tagged it with the prophecy/meta/the two characters I thought were the v. and the younger and more beautiful queen, because in the middle I said that imo cersei only cares for herself and I know ppl on her tag aren’t into reading that opinion. so: I didn’t tag it. now: how many people came in my inbox informing me my opinion of c. sucked, was biased and so on never mind lann*ncest never mind actually harassing me for it? well, enough that I had to shut down anon to avoid feeling like shit for two days about it. so like, I’m so high and mighty that I keep my opinions about people I don’t like untagged even if I think that the other side can’t read. but okay.

now, about jonc: listen, fact is, there’s exactly ten people in this fandom that I know of who give a shit about jonc period and three of them are fanartists who show up once in a while. like. exactly TEN. I made peace with the fact that no one gives a fuck about jonc, I 100% embraced that if I want content I have to do it myself, fine, whatever. but what I’m really getting sick of is that every goddamned fucking time I see the jonc tag updating (as in, five times each month if it’s a good month), it’s someone informing us of how selfish, pathetic, useless and dumb he is FOR THINGS THAT ALL OF THEIR FAVORITE CHARACTERS ACTUALLY DO ALL THE TIME and for which fandom at large praises them. or something about how him being in love with R is the most horribly pathetic thing that’s happened to adwd, or how he’s an idiot because he apparently hasn’t understood that aegon is fake because his eyes aren’t the same color as R’s when not even dany’s or viserys’s are, but no one says they aren’t targs for THAT now, do they? and sorry but reading that this dude would treat either rhaenys or jon snow like shit when this is canon:

Last night he'd dreamt of Stoney Sept again. Alone, with sword in hand, he ran from house to house, smashing down doors, racing up stairs, leaping from roof to roof, as his ears rang to the sound of distant bells. Deep bronze booms and silver chiming pounded through his skull, a maddening cacophony of noise that grew ever louder until it seemed as if his head would explode. Seventeen years had come and gone since the Battle of the Bells, yet the sound of bells ringing still tied a knot in his guts. 

Others might claim that the realm was lost when Prince Rhaegar fell to Robert's warhammer on the Trident, but the Battle of the Trident would never have been fought if the griffin had only slain the stag there in Stoney Sept. The bells tolled for all of us that day. For Aerys and his queen, for Elia of Dorne and her little daughter, for every true man and honest woman in the Seven Kingdoms. And for my silver prince.

now: it’s there black on white that he feels guilty for BOTH elia’s and rhaenys’s death, it’s not interpretation, it’s what is fucking written in there same as you can’t interpret that ned’s head got cut or cat’s last thought before she died was about ned loving her hair. so excuse me but I’m tired of going into a character who’s in my goddamned top ten and have to always, always run into people assuming he’s a pathetic selfish asshole (and the one time I tried to argue that there’s no way he’s *selfish*, maybe all the contrary to a pathological degree, the answer was basically ‘lol cannot hear you’ and not even a reblog but nvm that) rather than actual content because any of those people who have a obvious hateboner for jonc can’t just fucking tag it with *anti* jon connington. no, they have to use the character name and it’s never *content*, it’s just this drivel over and over again. and since I don’t do it with characters I don’t like, I’d appreciate if I could have the same courtesy spared for this asshole.

that said, the situation is that *one* single person (that I blocked but that’s apparently not enough for tumblr to spare me from seeing them on the tag) has asked that question to multiple blogs which all agree on jonc being shitty which means that it has popped up on the tag a whole lot in the last month and like....... if you don’t like that character why do you care so much, IDEK, but wow, I wrote one post, that I tagged with the character only, saying that ppl don’t bother to read his chapters (btw, one of the people who replied that he’d have been shitty to both jon and rhaenys was someone I ended up blocking because they were on the tag like ‘lololol grayscale I’m sure elia is laughing from the afterlife’ and when I told them it wasn’t funny and if they could avoid tagging that stuff I got told to fuck off but fine I guess, that was me being holier than thou I suppose...) which is true because they don’t, they only base their reading of jonc on that ONE line about elia which is a) obv. proof he’s jealous, b) way less bad than anything cersei and barristan think about her just to say two but lmao I don’t see them getting dragged for it, but everything else? what? two full chapters? do they exist? tyrion’s chapers? never knew them.

like.

anon, tbqh at this point if you wanna think I’m holier than thou just think that because while I like to think I’m not, if there is one thing I know I’m good at is text analysis (okay, last time I said I got two degrees based on text analysis I got told ‘ah okay so if she studies she’s obv. bragging so she knows nothing’ by someone whose main theory was robb stark is the unsung villain of these books but lol I mean having studied this counts for nothing, right???) and it irks me that in a fandom based on books/text analysis I have to read **meta** which is obviously made by people who haven’t read the text and then when given a counterargument ignore it. but even with that, do you see me engaging with it? nah. I can 100% assure you none of the people I would like to see out of the jonc tag actually go on the jonc tag nor follow me, so they will never know that I think their opinion is shit unless they go looking for it. and this because I might have engaged with at least two of them on the topic once - and nicely, not *judgmentally* - and no one gave a shit or reconsidered their stance, so like, excuse me if once per month I write a post on my own blog venting about how imo a character I like gets a shit treatment.

and for the love of god, anon, sorry, glad you like my opinions, but the fact that you’re coming at me assuming I am judgmental when I come from a fucking month and a half of people literally harassing me on anon over my fucking triple-tagged opinions on c/ersei and lann/incest and ignoring anything I said about how uncomfortable it was making me just because I happened to, in the most generous explanation, WRITE A META WHERE I C/P-ED CANON QUOTES WHERE C. WAS AWFUL TO J. WHEN IT CAME TO HIS DISABILITY which GRRM wrote, certainly not *me*, and it happened to get reblogged by asoiafuni, is really, really rich.

like, I tagged that shit to hell and back so people who aren’t interested in jb wouldn’t find it, I made sure to warn every time, I even tag anti-c/antijc posts so they don’t show up on mobile search in case ppl don’t have the anti tag blacklisted because I’m THAT invested into making sure other people can blacklist if they feel like it, but I can’t fucking say on my blog that I think some people in this fandom pull their meta out of their asses and haven’t even read the chapters of the character they’re supposed to discuss? like... really?

also, I’ll tell you a secret: I don’t remember 90% of what happened in dany’s adwd chapters and I don’t remember about 60% of what happened in her got-asos chapters. zero. now: do you see me meta-ing about dany and/or discuss her arc if not in extremely broad terms unless asked? no, because while I don’t particularly like her, I also don’t think it’d be fair for me to meta about her BECAUSE IF I DON’T REMEMBER HER CHAPTERS THEN I’D BE PULLING OPINIONS OUT OF MY ASS, and I don’t go judging anyone’s opinion re dany beyond the basics because mine is that her chapters are so boring I can’t even remember them. at most I’ll discuss the show version and I can swear to you that even if I’m not a fan or anything I’m still more lenient with her than about 90% of people who aren’t fans, and since I don’t pull meta out of my ass for people whose chapters I haven’t read, I would be extremely grateful of the rest of this fandom paid jon connington the same damn bloody effort, especially when he has TWO of them and hating on him that way is like... why would you, just ignore his fucking existence and let us ten ppl into him have a decent tag.

btw, the ONE time I dared say on a post that wasn’t tagged to hell and back to avoid people finding it ‘it’s kind of hypocritical that people fight themselves over bi!CHARACTER headcanons *because asoiaf doesn’t have lgbt POV CHARACTERS* when they ignore jonc exist and he actually is an lgbt pov character so maybe it’d be nice if they cared about the rep’, I got someone like WELL HE ISN’T LGBT REP ENOUGH, and on the other side I’ve had people actually giving me shit for liking him/writing him content because I’m straight so how do I dare writing a gay dude, and like, idk, since I can’t like him in peace in that sense, can the universe allow me to at least not see bullshit on the tag or is that too much to ask?

and to end this rant: anon, not to be that person, but fyi I’m hardly the person who dictates how the wind flies in this fandom unless we count maybe theon/robb fandom as a ship, my opinions aren’t nearly as popular as opinions belonging to ppl who imvho don’t read these books and that’s fine, I don’t particularly care beyond cultivating my garden as voltaire used to say and see if anyone else wants to come and see the flowers and in case they’re more than free to take some, but like...... the idea that me expressing an opinion about the fact that people in this fandom don’t use the same standards when judging characters and some haven’t read the book or forgot it and assume they know anyway is somehow being high and mighty when I also don’t tag that shit 99% of the time (with jonc I do it just because I know no one but me and ten other ppl goes on that tag) when there’s people in this fandom who outright deny what’s written black on white and actually literally harass you on anon for it when I can 100% swear to you that the only times I’ve gone on anon in my entire life were for a) memes that required being on anon, b) sending people headcanon requests, c) sending people I ALREADY KNEW and who KNEW IT WAS ME personal things that I didn’t want ppl to attach to me because I don’t owe 100% of my life history to tumblr dot com and I always put my face to my opinions.

like, glad you like my opinions, but honestly, if you think this is me being judgmental, fair enough but maybe I’m also tired of having to read stuff that’s based on not having fucking read the book.

thank you.