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jozor-johai · 6 months

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Revisiting the Rat Cook, Part 1: The Best Pie, and Lord Lamprey

This is the first part of a series I've been sitting on for a while, where I'm going to examine the symbols and themes present in the "Rat Cook" story, as relayed by Bran in ASOS Bran IV, and search reappearances of those elements throughout the rest of ASOIAF.

This series is predicated on the understanding that these books are rich with intentional symbolism, metaphor, and allegory, and that the repetition of these symbols and themes adds to their meaning.

In general, the symbols that are present in ASOIAF are limited by their ability to be inserted into the plot of the story (i.e. if the symbol of a stag killing a direwolf is important, there must be a way in which the characters are able to encounter such a scene within the plot's context). However, the metadiegetic legends that exist in-world for the characters of ASOIAF are not beholden to the same restrictions, and because GRRM is able to invent these myths in their entirety without restrictions on any of the individual symbolic elements, we can trust that each separate element of these in-world myths was placed intentionally.

With that in mind, I believe we can use stories like that of the Rat Cook as a sort of "road map" when looking at the reappearance of these same symbols and themes elsewhere in the story; I believe the "Rat Cook" story is the most distilled example of these elements. I don't mean to say that every instance of "rats" references the Rat Cook directly, but that the Rat Cook story provides a place where Martin is able to use these symbols in their most abstract form and describe their relationship to each other, so that when we see them appear again elsewhere in ASOIAF we might better understand what we are being shown.

So, among other things, the Rat Cook story is about a rat which eats rats, or a cook who serves kings; The Rat Cook story is about fathers and sons, about cannibalism, about trust, about vengeance, and about damning one's legacy.

This is likely going to be a 9-part series, but ideally almost all of these parts will be able to stand on their own. Each post will inform the next as I build my analysis, but hopefully each individual post is also interesting in its own right.

RtRC Part 1: "The Best Pie You Have Ever Tasted" and "Lord Lamprey"

This opening part, for better or worse, is going to retread some well-discussed ground: the clear parallels between the "Rat Cook" story and the incident in which Lord Manderly serves certain overlarge pies in ADWD The Prince of Winterfell, a scene lovingly dubbed "Frey Pie". However, as well-established as this comparison is, I want to begin here so I can begin to introduce how a closer analysis of the Rat Cook themes are present in this uncontroversially parallel scene, and how they might add more depth to interpreting that moment.

Not only does the scene evoke the same imagery, serving pie to the Lords amidst conspicuously missing sons, but the connection becomes even more direct when Wyman Manderly looks directly to the camera and says, “Hey reader, if you’re wondering where those Freys are, think back to any scary stories you know about pie”.

Okay, he doesn’t actually say that, but it’s close enough, and as much of a nudge we’re like to get from Martin (and which still went over my head on my first read through). Instead he does the next best thing, cueing Abel to sing while staggering past our POV:

"We should have a song about the Rat Cook," he was muttering, as he staggered past Theon, leaning on his knights. "Singer, give us a song about the Rat Cook."

Manderly seems to acknowledge the similarities himself, and most have noticed as well.

However, making the comparison between the story of the Rat Cook and Manderly’s actions is particularly interesting in their differences.

There are many ways in which Manderly’s pies, as a mirror, are appropriately an inversion of certain elements in the Rat Cook myth.

Returning to the scene as we see it in ADWD The Prince of Winterfell:

“Ramsay hacked off slices with his falchion and Wyman Manderly himself served, presenting the first steaming portions to Roose Bolton and his fat Frey wife, the next to Ser Hosteen and Ser Aenys, the sons of Walder Frey. "The best pie you have ever tasted, my lords," the fat lord declared. "Wash it down with Arbor gold and savor every bite. I know I shall." “True to his word, Manderly devoured six portions, two from each of the three pies, smacking his lips and slapping his belly and stuffing himself until the front of his tunic was half-brown with gravy stains and his beard was flecked with crumbs of crust.”

Manderly takes on only some of the roles of the Rat Cook here. Despite his status as lord, he plays the role of the humble cook, personally serving Roose Bolton, Walda Bolton (née Frey), Hosteen Frey, and Aenys Frey, all standing in for the “Andal King”. In this way, the role of “Andal King” as someone who has official power and the role of “Rat Cook” as effectively powerless dissident are played out straightforwardly. Bolton and his allies are backed by their army and the authority of the crown while Manderly has no official backing of his own.

Wyman even physically resembles the Rat Cook; Wyman’s blue eyes indicate he is presumably pale, and Wyman is prodigiously large, to mimic the descriptor of “white, and almost as huge as a sow”.

However, like the “Andal King” himself, who had a “second slice” of his own son, it is Wyman Manderly, and not Bolton nor the Freys, who devours two portions from each of the pies. In this way, the roles have elements which are interchangeable.

Wyman is acting out both roles, which is especially interesting because in this comparison is a single most definitive contrast: The Rat Cook, most notably, is not punished for serving the pie, as "a man has a right to vengeance". Instead, he is punished for violating guest right.

Now, Wyman—who lost his son to the Freys at the Red Wedding—certainly has a “right to vengeance”, but betraying guest right is something which Wyman Manderly takes great pains not to do. Manderly conspicuously notes that he gave the three dead Freys guest gifts upon their parting, marking them as no longer guests under his roof, and subsequently, theoretically, freeing him to kill them. Manderly introduces the idea while Davos marks the distinction for the reader’s sake in ADWD Davos IV:

“The Freys came here by sea. They have no horses with them, so I shall present each of them with a palfrey as a guest gift. Do hosts still give guest gifts in the south?" "Some do, my lord. On the day their guest departs.”

The Freys, on the other hand, as executors of the Red Wedding, are the most notable violators of guest right, while the Boltons contributed their part as well; both are being punished for that sin by Manderly-the-Rat-Cook here, marking the inversion of the story. In this iteration, the party serving the pie seems to warrant no judgment; instead, the pie itself is the judgment, served as retribution. With that connection in mind, it's worth remembering the other importance of the Rat Cook story, based on its placement in ASOS and which I think has often been overshadowed by Manderly’s “Frey Pies” incident.

In the Rat Cook story, after the Rat Cook's punishment, he spends an immortal future forever eating his own descendants, a scenario in which Bran describes the rats of the Nightfort as “children running from their father”. That eternal, kin- and legacy- devouring doom does not just come secondary to the punishment, it is a part of the punishment following the violation of guest right, and introduces the notion of an entire family being cursed for that violation... and, for good measure, is brought up in ASOS Bran IV, chapter that occurs only a few chapters after the Red Wedding itself.

In one respect, this is just another reinforcement for the reader of the sanctity of guest right and of the laws of the old gods. Coming so soon after the Red Wedding, the Rat Cook story hints at the fall of House Frey. Walder Frey, most culpable violator of guest right, has apparently doomed the rest of his dynasty to death, punished for his actions, the way that the Rat Cook, too, is a patriarch who creates not only his own ruin but also the ruin of his progeny. Although Walder himself is not literally tying the nooses, it is Walder who has metaphorically become the father "devouring his children" indirectly through his ruthlessness. Wyman Manderly, then, is merely an agent of that doom.

On the subject of the Freys being cursed by violating guest right, only one of the named consumers of the pie, Aenys Frey, is truly mirroring the Rat Cook legend by literally eating his own son, Rhaegar Frey. Both Aenys and Hosteen Frey, on the other hand, are specifically called out in the scene as being the “sons of Walder Frey”. It’s appropriate within the mirrored Rat Cook motif to invoke Walder’s name as patriarch as well as the promise of other “sons” that might succumb to their father’s insatiable appetite for status; this sentence invokes the dynasty of the Frey household. Indeed, Walder Frey himself also has shared motifs with the Rat Cook: like the immortal Rat Cook, Walder Frey has nearly innumerable children and grandchildren, and he too seems to refuse to die.

If a named heir in Westeros is like the ASOIAF version of Chekov’s gun, then the Late Walder Frey is sitting on Chekov’s arsenal; once he becomes the late Late Lord Frey, it’s going to explode. If that happens in an upcoming book, then the Rat Cook story might be setting up the idea of how an eventual succession crisis of House Frey might further this metaphorical connection, with this doomed family turning on itself, each running from the shadow of their father’s legacy like the Rat Cook's children run from him in the Nightfort.

Lord Lamprey

Now, to push through a little more symbolic linking between the Frey Pie scene and Lord Manderly:

If we consider the “pie” element as a key part of the Rat Cook story, then seeing a “pie” specifically in the hands of Wyman Manderly prompts a connection with a noted favorite of Manderly’s: lamprey pie. As early as ACOK Bran II, we learn that:

“His own people mock him as Lord Lamprey”,

Interestingly, we see in that same chapter a telling metaphor considering Manderly and lampreys not in a pie:

“Lord Wyman attacked a steaming plate of lampreys as if they were an enemy host”.

Considering Wyman’s lampreys-as-enemy association makes for curious contrast later, in ADWD Davos IV, as Manderly is feigning allegiance with the hated Freys. Here, Manderly has just stepped away from the feast in order to secretly treat with Davos, and the food served may contain more meaning than at first appears:

“In the Merman's Court they are eating lamprey pie and venison with roasted chestnuts. Wynafryd is dancing with the Frey she is to marry. The other Freys are raising cups of wine to toast our friendship.”

The reappearance of this noted lamprey pie might take on more significance knowing that some of those eating it become a pie later on. The reminder of the association between Manderly and his lamprey pies seems even more intentional when the “Lord Lamprey” nickname conspicuously returns as Bolton’s men search for the missing Freys in ADWD Reek III:

"You did not find our missing Freys." The way Roose Bolton said it, it was more a statement than a question. "We rode back to where Lord Lamprey claims they parted ways, but the girls could not find a trail."

Invoking his nickname in this scene draws a connecting line between Manderly’s favorite pie, the “enemy host” of lampreys, the missing Freys, and “lamprey pie” being served as a symbol of the fake “friendship” between the Freys and Manderlys.

If that Frey-Manderly friendship is marked by mentions of lamprey pie, and Manderly loves to eat lamprey like he would eat an enemy, and we see in The Prince of Winterfell that Manderly apparently loves to eat his enemies, having two portions of each Frey pie, we might think that the Freys are being paralleled with Manderly’s favorite pie filling: lampreys. If that is the case, then comparing the punished Freys to lampreys is a scathingly fitting image, and I mean that literally.

Considering that carnivorous lampreys latch onto fishes to slowly eat the fish’s blood and flesh while the fish still swims, then looking at an image like this makes for some serious symbolic resonance if you consider the Tullys as fish (as they often are described) and the pie-filling Freys as pie-filling lampreys. It certainly provides a strong visual metaphor for the Frey’s “late” and half-hearted vassalage to Hoster Tully, how they dealt with Catelyn, and how they are now parasitically using Edmure—he sits in Riverrun at the end of ADWD, but with Freys latched onto him, bleeding him like they did his family.

This series is otherwise about pies and rats, not lampreys, but I will mention a few other interesting associations with lampreys that are worth looking into. The Stokeworths, when they are desperately trying to secure a match for Lollys, serve each of their prospective suitors lamprey pie, perhaps a signaling of the Stokeworth’s parasitic place at court, or the attitude towards their search for their daughter’s match. Note that in that context, Littlefinger remarks that he loves lamprey pie, perhaps fittingly for someone who has risen high by making use of his parasitic attachments to those more powerful. By contrast, when our intrepid advocate for truth and justice—Davos—is jailed after his return from the Battle of the Blackwater, he is served lamprey pie in the dungeons, but finds it “too rich” to eat. We have already seen that Davos has no stomach for the blind flattery that some of Stannis’ other lords have, and this scene describes that same character trait. I believe there are even further associations that are worth investigating, but for the sake of this essay, we must move on and end here for now.

In the next part, I'll focus on how it's relevant that the Rat Cook's pie and Manderly's pie were both allegedly "pork" pies, and where that reappears as well.

#asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #rat cook #asoiaf theories #literature analysis #wyman manderly #walder frey #RtRC

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emprcaesar · 7 months

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ned + ashara = jon is one of my personal favorite theories.

it’s most definitely a red herring but i don’t care. but it’s also possible because why else would she kill herself. her brother arthur dies at the hands of ned then he takes his bastard and is like sorry you can’t see him again and i won’t tell him anything about you. so she’s all alone in starfall with only her brothers sword and the one thing that was hers (her son) was taken from her and the man she loved betrayed her by getting married TO SOMEONE HE WASNT EVEN BETROTHED TO just to honor his brother. now she has to live with the shame of a bastard who she can’t even see. i’d kill myself too.

also if this is true then jon is 100% older than robb. ned is not the type to cheat.

#house dayne is my favorite minor house #don’t think this is me shitting on catelyn #shitting on ned kinda #asoiaf books #house stark #asoiaf #game of thrones #jon snow #eddard stark #ashara dayne #house dayne #asoiaf theories #n+a=j #catelyn stark

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mryoyo000 · 3 months

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more TWOW predictions and theories

-Osha gets a degree in library science

-Lady Stoneheart tries French fries

-Stannis tries ice skating

-one of the Children of the Forest tries to involve Bran in a pyramid scheme

-Dany buys jeggings

-Cersei becomes a cryptozoologist

-Arya takes a course in nature photography

-Sam Tarly goes to a wedding and doesn’t enjoy it

-Cersei goes to a wedding but purposefully goes against the dress code

-Jaime buys a frozen pizza

#asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #the winds of winter #the winds of winter predictions #literary theories #asoiaf theories #asoiaf predictions #twow speculation #asoiaf speculation #cersei lannister #jaime lannister #bran stark #rickon stark #samwell tarly #arya stark

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sailor-hufflepuff · 3 months

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Just had an idea I really like, that would be so cool to read in Winds of Winter/A Dream of Spring:

(Assuming they ever get published.)

I’ve always liked the theory that the Stark dead can be called from the grave to fight the Others , which is why it’s so important they’re buried in the crypts and there must always be a Stark in Winterfell. (To call them up, should the need arise).

You know whose bones were taken to the crypts too?

Lady’s!

All of the dire wolves prove important and/or symbolic to their Stark halves ending. Grey Wind and Robb are killed together. Jon (potentially?) survives death by going into Ghost. Nymeria going wild in the woods represents Arya becoming “no one”.

And then Lady, who belongs to the “least” Stark of all, is killed before she even makes it south, showing that Sansa loses all her connection to her family. Which would be enough, thematically, if she died in the Red Keep. Or married and was absorbed into another house.

But assuming the foreshadowing (and tv show) are right, Sansa is instead heading to the throne in the North, which is rather an odd ending for someone whose “Starkness” is dead.

What could be more appropriate than Sansa coming home during the Long Night, and Lady rising from the dead to save her? To show that, whatever happened down south, Sansa IS a Stark, will ALWAYS be a Stark?

#asoiaf #got #game of thrones #sansa stark #lady #a song of ice and fire #asoiaf theories #winds of winter #a dream of spring

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hollowwhisperings · 1 year

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Jojen is Fine, Actually: "Weirwood Paste" is Weirwood Paste.

CW: humanitarian diets, body horror, general blasphemy, mention of grooming (in the context of creepy tree wizards).

Okay so my being a HUGE Jojen (& House Reed in general) fan gives me an Obvious Bias against the idea of Jojen Dying Offscreen.

My being a huge literary nerd & lore geek, however, informs my Metaphor Senses that Jojen is Fine*, Actually.

The "Weirwood Paste" is Weirwood Paste: made of weirwood seeds, locally sourced. Said "Local Weirwood Tree" being. Y'know. Brynden Rivers.

It's Brynden Paste.

(*Fine: chronically ill, majorly depressed, freezing cold, surrounded by creepy tree people, stuck in a zombie wasteland, if he ever goes home he Dies, repeatedly dreaming of his own death... but, at least, Not Dead nor Being Eaten by the Prince of his Dreams? He's "Fine".)

First and foremost: storytelling conventions, even in a series as "deliberately unconventional" as ASOIAF, tend to tell audiences that NO ONE is genuinely "dead" until you see a body. And personally check its pulse. And test for rigor mortis. And maybe stab them in a lethal place, jusr to be Sure. And then burn the body, scatter its ashes, send couriers off in different directions to hide what remains in Remote Places never to be known of by the other couriers. Maybe Silence the couriers if they come back.

Er, you get the picture.

Most subscribers to "Jojenpaste" are in it for the lolz or assume The Worst due to Jojen's non-presence in the latest Bran chapters (aaand Jojen's being Very Permanently Dead in That Dragon Show). It's also an "easy" assumption that Since GRRM Is GRRM, any & all opportunities for Humanitarianism will be fully utilized.

Except... the weirwood paste is ALREADY "made of people" just because it's Weirwood (specifically, weirwood seeds) and the series has consistently described weirwood trees as "[human]".

Weirwood have "bone white" bark; they have Faces carved into them; they "Watch" and "Listen" and "Witness": this is consistent across POV characters, even before Jojen casually brings up "oh they're what Greenseers Become" or any meetings with a Literal Tree Man.

Weirwoods are described in human terms, doing human things, and at least 1 major character has been directly equivicated with Weirwoods for Plot Purposes: Ghost the Direwolf (and wolves, of course, are consistently used to mean "someone of House Stark" and the Starklings especially).

Then there is The Creepy Tree Man in the room: Brynden Rivers, called "Three-Eyed Raven" by Bran and Jojen (for that was how their Dreams interpreted him) or "The Last Greenseer" by the Singers (...despite BRAN very pointedly Being There To Prove Otherwise).

Brynden is also, as mentioned, a Tree Now.

A Weirwood Tree.

Y'know. Like the ones whose seeds make the Paste Bran's been eating.

So, unless the Singers have been sneaking about in Others' Territory to collect seeds from a different weirwood tree... that Paste is made of BRYNDEN.

Bran being fed "Brynden Paste' while Brynden Indoctrinates Teaches Bran to be a Tree Wizard makes far more sense, logistically & thematically, than Jojen getting shanked offscreen to belatedly be revealed to be "part of Bran all along".

For one thing, Meera would gladly set the Cave & everyone in it on fire if anyone so much as looks at her baby brother suspiciously. For another, Brynden is Right There for the eating & is filled with all sorts of Prophecy Juice: he's a Blackwood, he's a Targaryen, he's a Royal Bastard, he was an Infamous Spymaster with "A thousand eyes and one", he's done weird sacrifice BS before, he's a Greenseer (Jojen "only" has Greensight), he's a Living God (as per Singer & First Men Lore), the Cave Cult is trying to turn Bran INTO him...

There is a lot more "logic" to Bran's Magic Lessons featuring his knowingly (subconsciously, at least) eating Brynden than his secretly eating his friend. Human sacrifice tends to require Knowledge of the cost being paid & being Willing to do it anyway: Bran might be too tripped up on Paste to consciously connect the "Weirwood Paste" he eats with "that Human Weirwood Tree i'm sitting next to" but the Singers explicitly tell Bran the Paste is made from Weirwood Seeds. Bran "knows".

Godeating (metaphoric & literal) is a trope that is most commonly found in JRPGs, nowadays, but it has Precedent throughout western mythology: the Titan Kronus ate each of his children as they were born, Zeus alone escaping, in an effort to Dodge Prophecy; Zeus inherited Said Prophecy and, being his Father's Son, ate his first wife. The details of the Titanomachy (the War against the Titans by their reasonably upset kids) are Lost but Zeus, at least, gained all his Wife's Wisdom (& her pregnancy too) after eating her: Athena may or may not have Taken It Back upon breaking out from her Eaten Mother & Dear Old Dad.

Consuming something in order to "become" what is eaten is Fairly Common, if not with that specific phrasing: vampires seldom explain their reproduction as "eat me to become me", whilst the adorable Nintendo character Kirby & his method of Powering Up via Playing Vacuum, is Rephrased out of Sheer Self-Preservation (no one, not even I, likes to admit that The Cute Pink Blob is an Eldritch Abomination). Many JRPGs & works in eastern media use similar themes of "monster eats monster" and "let's eat god" for the purposes of High Stakes Action. Japan & East Asia has a lot less "baggage" when it comes to utilizing themes from Abrahamic verse, meaning that western works using themes of [consuming the divine] and [apotheosis] use Vampire Methodology. Such is the case in the Dragon Age series & its Order of Grey Wardens (who are, From A Certain POV, dragon god vampires).

Within the ASOIAF series itself, Dany's eating a horse heart (raw) has Humanitarian Themes in service of Prophecy and [Divinity]: the horse heart to the Dothraki, a society of horselords, could be what weirwood seeds are to First Men (especially given Jojen's whole "btw, the trees are gods are former greenseers").

Brynden & the Cave's Singers (whom I dearly hope are some long-exiled Cult & not reflective of Singers as a whole) are not particularly subtle in their Intentions for Bran: he is to be their New "Last" Greenseer. Bran is to Become Brynden or Brynden is to Become Bran: either and possibly both are plausible, though how compliant with the Singers' goals Brynden may be has yet to be revealed.

(the Brynden of F&B and D&E strikes me as someone who would gladly bodysnatch some poor kid for his own Agenda: the Singers seem unlikely to support fire-breathing foreigners, not without a Contingency Plan; somewhat likely to want Bran for the purposes of installing a Tree Hivemind Police State; and maybe, possibly... "just" wanting a Second God for their Cult in Bran, who probably Smells Better).

SUMMARY

Weirwoods are Personified in almost every appearance. Weirwood Trees are considered Gods. Jojen (& some Singers) have stated that the Next Evolutionary Phase of a Greenseer is "Weirwood Tree". Brynden "the Last Greenseer" is part of a Weirwood Tree.

Brynden & the Singers are Turning Bran Into A Weirwood Tree.

Bran's current diet is Tree Paste. His magic teacher, Brynden, is Part-Tree. The Nearest Tree to make Paste from is Brynden. The Paste is made of Brynden.

(Let's NOT think too hard on which parts of Brynden: I've only gotten this far in this Meta by using "Hunanitarian" as a pun.)

Eating Gods to Become A God is an existing Trope. Brynden is a God, by Singer & First Men definitions. Bran is being Groomed to Become Brynden, a God. To Become Brynden, Bran must Eat Brynden.

TL;DR

The Weirwood Paste is Weirwood Paste and Brynden is the Weirwood: the Paste is not "Jojen", it's BRYNDEN.

Jojen is Not Paste: Jojen is Alive but Not Well & Very Depressed.

#bran stark meta #valyrianscrolls #jojen reed #brynden rivers #the last greenseer #asoiaf theories #cw cannibalism #methodology of apotheosis #suspiciously remote tree people cultists are suspicious #i think i forgot to add back my theory that meera is overdue for some arson and jaywalking #the title is the last greenseer not three-eyed crow #three-eyed crow is just his default avatar in the minds of telepathic children #jojen doesnt go around calling bran winged wolf and expecting others to know what that means in his dreams #jojen goes around calling bran his prince #because bran could become the literal man of his dreams #i imagine jojen was disappointed to discover his prophetic dreams were emphasis prophetic

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jeyneofpoole · 8 months

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i must not go onto asoiaf tiktok. asoiaf tiktok is the mind-killer. asoiaf tiktok is the little-death that brings total obliteration. i will face the thieves and their bad opinions. i will permit them to pass over me and through me. and when they have gone past i will turn the inner eye to see their path. where the fake theories have gone there will be nothing. only the tumblr mutuals will remain.

#RAHHHHHH #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #valyrianscrolls #asoiaf theories

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winterprince601 · 10 months

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if, and i suspect this might be the case, jon comes back a liiiittle bit wrong (fire and blood levels elevated) i am actually foaming at the mouth anticipating the possible parallels between him and lady stoneheart. completely at odds in life but thematically joined by the common cause of seeking ruthless vengeance for house stark in their afterlives? IMPECCABLE.

i've also always thought it incredibly tragic, without pointing fingers, that jon and cat loved the same people fiercely but could never understand each other past their mutual fear. with the social conventions that bound them in life stripped away, it would be incredibly satisfying to recognise that protective and loving core they share, corrupted by suffering though it might be.

#this is all obviously hypothetical cough cough grrm #and i don't want jon to steal lady stonehearts style obviously #he needs to be wrong in his own special way #cat's transformation into lady s from a warm capable and determined woman is it's own kind of tragic #i want fresh pain from jon's resurrection #asoiaf #jon snow #catelyn stark #catelyn tully #house stark #winds of winter #a song of ice and feels #asoiaf theories #asoiaf theory

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agentrouka-blog · 9 months

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What's your favorite ASOIAF theory?

Apart from jonsa? And Arya finding peace in her reunion with Lady Stoneheart? Um. You can't make me choose..?

Let me think.

Probably Bran playing magical cat and mouse in the timeline, trying not to get caught gently manipulating events so they lign up the right way to resolve the threat of the Others. That's my own theory, so I maybe shouldn't count it. But I love it so. My clever little baby. <3

I also have a soft spot for Timett son of Timett being the son of that missing daughter of Alys Waynwood and Elys Arryn (Gulltown branch), ahead in the line of succession of Harry the so-called Heir. I know I didn't come up with that, but it would be such a GRRM thing to do. Not that I think it will matter, it's more of an easter egg.

Or did you mean Hilarious Brain Twangs from the lower layers of the iceberg? :D

Honestly, I really don't know.

What are yours? :)

#jonsa #<- for filtering #asoiaf theories

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catofoldstones · 6 months

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Please add any theories you have in the notes. Also, please reblog for a larger sample size.

#asoiaf #sansa stark #petyr baelish #polls #littlefinger #winterfell #eyrie #the vale #the winds of winter #twow #twow speculation #a dream of spring #ados #ados speculation #asoiaf theories #theories #asoiaf polls

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pessimisticpigeonsworld · 6 months

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In this post, I talked a bit about how the removal of magic in GOT destroyed the character of Euron Greyjoy. Now I'm going to talk about how it negatively impacted Daenerys' character.

Magic is fundamental to Dany's storyline, which is why her story is one of the only ones that still has magic in it on the show. However, that magic is drastically reduced, there's now simply hatching the dragons, the calling she feels to do so, and like two visions in the House of the Undying. Meaning, aside from dragon riding, Dany's magic is only in the first two seasons.

I want to talk first about how they reduced her dreams. In AGOT, we have almost a dream per chapter for Dany, each of them pointing to her future as the Mother of Dragons, a dragon rider, and her later story points. In ACOK, her visions in the House of the Undying point to not only her future, but those of other characters (i.e. the Red Wedding, Tyrion, Jon, the Others, etc). ASOS sees the first appearance of Quaithe in Dany's dreams, and in ADWD, Dany dreams in the Dothraki Sea and sees Quaithe a few more times. That's a pretty big difference from the show's portrayal.

The removal of these dreams serve to make Dany seem much more similar to the rest of her family than she really is. It's a way for them to make her seem less remarkable and force their "parallels" with Aerys. In the books, while other Targaryens have dragon dreams, none of them are quite to the same level as Dany, with the exception of maybe Daenys (we don't actually know). She's meant to be set apart, just like the other main five. She, Jon, Bran, Arya, and even Tyrion are meant to have stronger connections to magic than any other main characters.

Jumping back to Quaithe, removing her really shows how little they cared about George's plans for Dany's character. Her connection to the resurgence of magic is touched on in the show, but not to the same extent as it is in the books. Quaithe is constantly telling Dany to go to Assai, one of the magical centers of the world. Obviously there is something important in Asshai that has to do with magic and the dragons. But apparently, D&D decided to fuck around and drop that whole idea, leaving Dany with an easy and pretty boring storyline after Meereen.

Finally, the show removed most of the prophecies. I did cover this partially in the dreams section, but there's more to be said about erasing the prophecies. Mainly the Prince that was Promised/Azor Ahai prophecy. Obviously, in the show, it was decided that the prophecy should be completely thrown aside and Arya should kill the Night King and the War for the Dawn be over in a few hours. This is a gross mishandling of the themes, which makes sense given who the head writers were. Prophecies are a key part of ASOIAF, and the Prince that was Promised/Azor Ahai is definitely the most important. Targaryens throughout history made unwise decisions in the name of the prophecy: Viserys II forced Aegon IV and Naerys to marry, Jaegaerys II forced Aerys and Rhaella to marry, (according to HoTD) Viserys I killed Aemma for a son, and Aegon conquered Westeros. Clearly this is important, writing it out in the name of "subverting expectations" is the dumbest fucking idea ever, right after mad queen Dany.

D&D also wrote out many magical objects that clearly are meant to have importance to the story. The glass candles and the dragon binder are magical objects that will change the course of Dany's life as she knows it. Whether the dragon binder Victarion has will work or not is irrelevant, its very existence could drive Dany off course from Westeros to Asshai. Maester Marwyn is bringing a glass candles to Dany and Quaithe warned her that they are burning again. The magic the glass candles have would have a massive impact on how Dany will proceed. After all, they could allow her to communicate with people in Westeros or Asshai or enhance her dragon dreams. They will also put her in direct conflict with the Citadel, as the Maesters use the glass candles as examples for magic's nonexistence.

Magic is integral to the ASOIAF universe. Removing it makes the story so much more boring and damages or destroys character arcs. Daenerys suffered so much in the adaptation, and one of the greatest blows was the removal of magic in her story. It shows how lazy D&D were, since they couldn't be bothered to figure out the magic system of the world they are adapting. It removes the interesting ideas George came up with, making it into someone's historical fiction smut fic when mixed with the other ideas D&D put in.

#daenerys targaryen #anti got #anti d&d #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #asoiaf theories #azor ahai

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