Frey family reunion

Poisoning Joffrey would create a bigger stir. But Tyrion choking to death would still probably cause quite a stir as well. And once again, I think we’re overestimating how hard it would have been for Sansa to have slipped out without anyone even choking to death. We hear from the Kingsguard just how hard it was to keep track of everyone during the wedding especially at the time of the Pie. The only one really paying attention to Sansa at the wedding, was Tyrion. And if he was the one choking to death, he’d be in a pretty bad position to note her leaving early. And the one big benefit for both Olenna and Petyr in Tyrion being the victim, is that Sansa suddenly becomes free to marry. If Tyrion choked to death, would there have been any real suspicion to go around? After all don’t forget the whole point of the poison. The plotters were hoping that it would appear to all that the victim choked to death on his food. It was Joffrey’s death and Cersei’s accusation against Tyrion, that first laid the idea that a poison was used. Cersei would not have made that accusation if Tyrion had choked to death. Unfortunately for Tyrion, his death wouldn’t lead to a lot of questions because he wasn’t terribly popular, even among his own family. The only real negative for Tywin would be that his death would free up Sansa to be taken to Highgarden for marriage. But it probably wouldn’t be a big enough negative to dare lose Highgarden as an ally. Which is the whole reason they had to rush the marriage of Tyrion and Sansa. They knew if push came to shove, they couldn’t stop Olenna from taking Sansa to Highgarden to marry her off.

We have one very particular reason to doubt the official story, in that GRRM specifically told us that he may have some surprises in store with regards to the conclusion that Olenna poisoned Joffrey. As for practical reasons to doubt this version, we have one very significant one, in that Olenna probably couldn’t have reached the chalice to drop the poison. The chalice was drunk without issue by Joffrey and then placed on top of the table in front of Tyrion. When Tyrion was told by Joffrey to serve him, Tyrion had to stand up on his chair to reach the chalice. Olenna who is about as tall as Tyrion would have had a lot of trouble to have dropped the poison into the chalice. Especially since she would have had to have once again left her place at the Dias to do so. It’s possible that Margaery could have poisoned the chalice. And maybe that’s the surprise GRRM alluded to. Olenna did give a specific look to Margaery when Sansa told her about Joffrey being a monster. Perhaps Olenna taught Margaery the fine art of poisoning and left it up to Margaery to rid herself of her future husband if that’s what she wanted to do. Of course, I still suspect that George may be playing with Sansa’s POV, and having her repress her own actions at the wedding. After all, there is really only one person who would have been in the best position to have either dropped the poison in Joffrey’s chalice or Tyrion’s pie, and that would be Sansa.

I’m not completely sure why you’re being this stubborn on the issue. You’re basically arguing that it was impossible for Petyr to have heard the bells ringing even though you admittedly can’t answer where exactly Petyr’s ship was coming from when it came upon Sansa’s rowboat. Now, I don’t know exactly where Petyr’s ship was coming from either, but my argument is that based on the geography of the bay, the direction Sansa’s rowboat was going in, and the fact that Petyr’s ship came out of the dark, thus not out of the East which would have put him further from King’s Landing, makes it very possible that he was positioned close enough at King’s Landing to have heard the bells. It’s also the only reason that Petyr could have been that certain that Joffrey was poisoned. I don’t care how arrogant he is or how good he thought the plan was, the simple fact of the matter is, the poisoning itself was outside of his hands, he had to rely on others to do the dirty work. The only thing that would have made him certain that Joffrey was dead was the sound of the bells. The same confirmation that Sansa had after she fled King’s Landing. This argument kind of reminds me on the attacks on the Braavosi Lemon tree issue. There are posters scoffing at the discrepancies having any meaning, even after GRRM himself confirms that yes, it does mean something that he can’t reveal yet. Here, you’re arguing that there can be no other explanation other than Olenna having poisoned Joffrey. Even though the author himself says that he may have some surprises in store for us concerning the identity of Joff’s poisoner. Since you’re not really coming up with any possible surprises it seems a bit presumptuous for you to scoff at those of us who are.

There are three characters that GRRM frames in a window looking down (like an outsider) on the events taking place outside the window. Jon, Bran, and Baelish. So make with that what you want.

No, if Petyr was further from King’s Landing than Sansa he would have been coming in from the East, but he wasn’t. He came out of the darkness after the sun had already started to rise in the East, thus Petyr was not coming from further out in the Bay. If anything he and Sansa’s rowboat were of an equal distance from King’s Landing right before they came together. See above. It’s not a big leap at all. Petyr is sure that Joffrey was dead because George had the bells ringing in King’s landing. So if Joffrey was the intended target, than the bells confirmed Petyr’s plan was successful. If Joffrey wasn’t the intended target, than Petyr could obviously conclude that the poisoner(s) decided to change their target. And Petyr could fairly easily conclude that the poisoner would have also had a motive to poison Joffrey even if he had hoped they would poison Tyrion. According to the assumed version of events, Sansa is never told that Joffrey or anyone else is going to be poisoned. She’s just told that when an opportunity presents itself, get to the Godwood. Allegedly, unbeknownst to Sansa the plotters are going to present her with that opportunity by poisoning someone at the wedding. But the poisoning itself is out of the hands of Littlefinger. If Olenna was supposed to be the poisoner, it’s certainly possible that the old tiny lady, couldn’t find an opportunity to poison Joffrey, or she was caught in the act, or she simply changed her mind. But Sansa could still have found an opportunity to have left the wedding without the poisoning. Even the Kingsguards admit that they couldnt’ keep track of what people were doing because of the chaotic nature of the wedding. And we hadn’t even gotten to the bedding yet. Regardless, Sansa’s presence shouldn’t have been enough to have confirmed to Petyr that Joffrey was in fact dead. Thus we have the bells ringing.

What George is saying is that he’s not going to change what he intended because some people may have figured out the mystery. That’s not what I’m suggesting. I’m suggesting that George is allowing for the possibility of a surprise twist in what he wrote. And at the very least giving him multiple options of how he wants the story to go. When I put together my theory that Sansa may in fact actually be the poisoner, I very painstakingly quoted all of the portions of the text that might allow George to take this route. That doesn’t mean I necessarily think he’s going to go with this. I’m just highlighting portions of the text that would allow him to adjust the story to that outcome if he decides to go that route. It’s why George describes himself as a gardener (I think). He gives himself several different options to branch his story out in various directions. So when he says there may be a surprise I think he’s being very literal as opposed to being coy. There may be a surprise and Olenna might not have poisoned Joffrey, or it may be just as it appears to the careful reader. George has two books to decide what direction he wants to go in.

No, not really. King’s Landing is a pretty big place. Sansa is coming from the the channel which is south of King’s Landing and heads in a northerly direction. So presumably she may be heading in a northerly direction gradually away from the city. Petyr’s ship probably doesn’t come from the East because it’s not shown by the rising sun. Instead it probably comes from somewhere North of Sansa. And perhaps too, like Sansa they are heading in a direction south gradually sailing away from King’s Landing. And they meet up further out in the bay. I think based on the available evidence it’s most likely that Sansa’s rowboat is heading Northeast, while Petyr is traveling Southeast. They meet up in the bay, and Petyr’s ship turns East when they meet up with the rowboat. The issue is that the bells were one of the last things she heard. So presumably Petyr’s ship, which is also on the move would have also been in a position to hear the sound of the bells carrying over the water, even if it was before they finally came in contact with Sansa’s boat. I’m not talking about Joff surviving the consumption of the poison, I’m talking about the poisoners being caught in the act. So let’s assume that Olenna was caught with the poison or caught trying to poison Joffrey’s cup, that still would have created a commotion which could have allowed Sansa to escape. Thus even if Joffrey was the intended target it was the bells that confirmed to Petyr that the poisoning was successful.

It’s simple, George doesn’t want to reveal the possible surprises he may still have in store for the Purple wedding. So the question is if this is a closed case as you suggest, why does George specifically state that while it appears Olenna poisoned Joffrey he may have some additional surprises.

You may have to wonder if George thinks this “accepted version of events” is necessarily the only possible version: Once again GRRM’s own words from a Rolling Stones interview: So if George has gone out of his way for the reader to accept this as the only version of events that is possible, then what are the additional surprises that he may reveal? I think George himself is telling us that the mystery of Joffrey’s death may have been revealed, or may not have been revealed, depending on what George decides to do in future books. So I think George has left enough wiggle room to throw us a curveball.

Let’s assume that Littlefinger was in on the plot to kill Tyrion. He also has another motivation for wanting to create a distraction to allow for Sansa to escape. So Littlefinger wants the poisoning to happen at a public event that everyone is going to be at to allow Sansa to escape. So in the scenario that Olenna was going to do the dirty work for him, he tells Olenna that Sansa will unwittingly (perhaps) provide the poison on the day of the wedding through the hairnet. When Olenna sees Sansa with the hairnet, Olenna tells Sansa that she is going to take her to Highgarden on the next day. Olenna’s motivation is to to marry Sansa to her son Willas, and she knows that Sansa will be free of her marriage to Tyrion if indeed Tyrion was the intended target. Or, in a scenario that I find more interesting and made a fairly lengthy post about, there is a possibility that none of the plotters, either Littlefinger or Olenna were willing to personally dirty their hands and the do the deed. But instead the poisoner was Sansa, and George had Sansa repress what she did directly in the next chapter as she swallowed a fit of hysterical laughter when she was told that she had a good heart. In which case, Olenna would have provided the poison to Sansa through Sansa’s hairnet, which would allow Sansa to then drop it into her husband’s food or wine, since she would have been the one with the best opportunity to do so.

I would note that the passage is that the bells were fading away, not that they had faded away. And just like Sansa is traveling in the bay, so is Littlefinger. And we also know that he wasn’t traveling from the East, where the sun was rising, because his ship came out of the darkness. So George also goes out of his way to show that Petyr wasn’t coming from further out in the Bay. So no, I don’t think the author wanted us to think that Petyr couldn’t have learned of Joff’s death from the ringing of the bells. In fact just the opposite. If Petyr wasn’t privy to exactly what happened inside the chapel how could he have been so sure of Joffrey’s death, whether or not Joffrey was the intended target. After all an attempted poisoning could have been a sufficient distraction to allow Sansa to escape unnoticed. So I think the bells were confirmation that it was now publicly known that the King was dead which is why Petyr knew it for a certainty when he had Dontos killed.

We actually have the benefit of the author specifically being asked about the Purple Wedding in an interview with Entertainment Weekly: So once again, how does that jive with the idea that Littlefinger wanted Joffrey poisoned, wanted everyone to realize Joffrey was poisoned, and laid the groundwork for Tyrion to be blamed for it? If Joffrey died from a poison, no matter how quick it was going to cause a disturbance from everyone around them, which would enable Sansa to escape. But here, a poison was used that the murderers would hope would go undetected. (Which begs the question, how was Littlefinger planning on freeing Sansa from Tyrion’s marriage if everything went as planned and the realm thought Joffrey choked to death on food?) And now perhaps, if Joffrey was the target we could expect there would be a more thorough investigation as to how he died. But if Tyrion was the intended target do we really think there would be such an investigation?

Maybe that’s going to be in the second half of the season, and they don’t have the visual effects finished yet? Otherwise, I’m with you. I assumed that they would hype Winterfell and a Targaryen(ish)/Stark(ish) type of relationship.

I think you’re discounting the reason that GRRM made the bells ring so soon after Joffrey’s death. It doesn’t terribly make sense that Sansa would have heard the bells so soon after her flight from the wedding feast especially since they were coming from across the city. But it becomes necessary if George wants a public acknowledgment that the King was dead. Which I think points to the fact that he wants to give Petyr a way of knowing about Joff’s death independent of being told by one of the eye witnesses. But I think that you are assuming that the ship is coming from further out in the sea when it reaches Sansa, and I’m not sure that this assumption is correct. I had to pull an image of King’s Landing to make sure I was properly oriented. But assuming the images are accurate, Sansa’s rowboat would have been traveling in a northerly direct if they were traveling along the channel towards Blackwater Bay. (I had earlier assumed that they would have been traveling in an easterly direction but that’s not apparently correct). That direction is perhaps even further confirmed by the fact that Peter’s ship comes out of the darkness towards them. That occurs as the sun is starting to rise in the East. So presumably the ship isn’t heading from the east (further out in the bay) where it would have been lit by the rising sun, but instead it is heading from the North, which allows it to appear out of the darkness. Now the question is did Petyr ever actually leave King’s Landing? If he had boarded the Merling King as it was parked outside of the channel, then he would have been hanging out on the ship an awfully long time. Tyrion comments that Petyr had left a fortnight before in his POV, which occurs even before the Martells made their arrival in King’s Landing. So that’s quite a while to be on the ship, but it’s still a possibility. The other possibility is that he was hiding out in one of his brothels, the same place perhaps that he hid Cat or hid the dwarves that were used at the wedding tourney. But regardless all we know is that his ship was traveling to meet Sansa and it was probably not traveling from further out in the bay, which would have put it to Sansa’s east, but traveling from somewhere north of Sansa’s location which could have put it anywhere within the vicinity of King’s Landing. Which also means that when he turned his ship right before Sansa boards he probably turns it from a southerly direction to facing the East which is where they would have had to turn to leave the Bay.

Nah, we just know that they meet up in the bay, and we know that Littlefinger had never actually left King’s Landing. There is no reason that they were parked deep out in the Bay. Petyr wasn’t on a recognizable ship, he was on a simple merchant vessel, so there is no reason they couldn’t have stayed anchored near King’s Landing. The only thing that Pety wouldnt’ have wanted anyone seeing is Sansa getting on that particular ship, which is why the two boats would have rendezvoused further out in the Blackwater.