The Doom of Valyria and The Forbidden Planet

[Bowen 747]

The Forbidden Planet is said to be George R.R Martin's favorite movie.  I propose that the plot of the movie may have implications for how the author set up the destruction of Valyria.  Here is a link for more information on this excellent Scifi movie:  [SPOILER WARNING IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE]

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049223/?ref_=nv_sr_1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet

If you have not seen this classic scifi and wish to see it, please do not proceed further.  I will spoil the plot for you.

Spoiler

In the movie, a super advanced race called the Krell disappeared on the eve of their greatest achievement.  They created a machine that can give them whatever they wanted.  Their own inner desires, the monsters from the id, caused their destruction.  They destroyed each other.  

The Valyrians built their city in the proximity of the Fourteen Flames.  We have been told that "fire is power" and the Valyrians used the fires of the volcanoes to perform magnificent magic.  They were also mining the precious metals around the volcanoes.  We know the mining activities were vast and on a scale beyond what goes on in even Casterly Rock.  The Valyrians were mining deeply using powerful magic and endless supply of labor.   Either their powerful magic got away from them and opened the taps, so to speak, or they dug too deep.

[The Fattest Leech]

I live this movie and happened to have watched it last Sunday. 

Yeah. It is George's favorite movie and he has the original Robby the Robot in his house! 

I am going to reread your post and get back to this. I have seen plenty of other bits that George seemingly used as inspiration for ASOIAF, but the Doom reference I didn't catch the way you did. Nice 

I got the Jon+Val+Castle Black/wall references, for sure. 

[The Fattest Leech]

 

Quote

The Valyrians built their city in the proximity of the Fourteen Flames.  We have been told that "fire is power" and the Valyrians used the fires of the volcanoes to perform magnificent magic.  They were also mining the precious metals around the volcanoes.  We know the mining activities were vast and on a scale beyond what goes on in even Casterly Rock.  The Valyrians were mining deeply using powerful magic and endless supply of labor.   Either their powerful magic got away from them and opened the taps, so to speak, or they dug too deep.

One more thing real quick like, this is also the broad strokes to the main plot in GRRM's story Override. Have you read that one? It is a short story, but the tension and suspicion build up nicely and makes for an interesting read. 

[Roswell]

5 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

The Forbidden Planet is said to be George R.R Martin's favorite movie.  I propose that the plot of the movie may have implications for how the author set up the destruction of Valyria.  Here is a link for more information on this excellent Scifi movie:  [SPOILER WARNING IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE]

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049223/?ref_=nv_sr_1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet

If you have not seen this classic scifi and wish to see it, please do not proceed further.  I will spoil the plot for you.

  Reveal hidden contents

In the movie, a super advanced race called the Krell disappeared on the eve of their greatest achievement.  They created a machine that can give them whatever they wanted.  Their own inner desires, the monsters from the id, caused their destruction.  They destroyed each other.  

The Valyrians built their city in the proximity of the Fourteen Flames.  We have been told that "fire is power" and the Valyrians used the fires of the volcanoes to perform magnificent magic.  They were also mining the precious metals around the volcanoes.  We know the mining activities were vast and on a scale beyond what goes on in even Casterly Rock.  The Valyrians were mining deeply using powerful magic and endless supply of labor.   Either their powerful magic got away from them and opened the taps, so to speak, or they dug too deep.

Well, you know, there is always a parallel on the Other side.  So if the Valyrians were performing extreme magic that got out of control then we can see where the First Men and the CotF may have dabbled in "ice" magic that went beyond their abilities to control.  Too much deforestation and messing around with skinchanging brought on the White Walkers.  Perhaps the Kings of Winter of the old days played around with magic.

[Roswell]

I have seen that movie.  It's very good for back then and for even today's standards.  It's the story not the special effects that make a movie great. 

As far as other explanations for the doom yours is the one on point with George's ideas.  It was an environmental mess caused by humans getting too bold in their pursuit of science (or magic, in this case).

[goomba]

5 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

Either their powerful magic got away from them and opened the taps, so to speak, or they dug too deep.

Intersting theory! Do you mean they exploded?

[The Fattest Leech]

7 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

The Forbidden Planet is said to be George R.R Martin's favorite movie.  I propose that the plot of the movie may have implications for how the author set up the destruction of Valyria.  Here is a link for more information on this excellent Scifi movie:  [SPOILER WARNING IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE]

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049223/?ref_=nv_sr_1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet

If you have not seen this classic scifi and wish to see it, please do not proceed further.  I will spoil the plot for you.

  Reveal hidden contents

In the movie, a super advanced race called the Krell disappeared on the eve of their greatest achievement.  They created a machine that can give them whatever they wanted.  Their own inner desires, the monsters from the id, caused their destruction.  They destroyed each other.  

The Valyrians built their city in the proximity of the Fourteen Flames.  We have been told that "fire is power" and the Valyrians used the fires of the volcanoes to perform magnificent magic.  They were also mining the precious metals around the volcanoes.  We know the mining activities were vast and on a scale beyond what goes on in even Casterly Rock.  The Valyrians were mining deeply using powerful magic and endless supply of labor.   Either their powerful magic got away from them and opened the taps, so to speak, or they dug too deep.

Ok. I have another minute to go over this.

The Krell create something so powerful that regular humans should not be in control of such "power". They dug out and created this massive 20 square mile underground complex of a machine that creates anything you can desire. This are would be the Valyrian mines and underground volcano systems.

The main guy, Adams, has his second in command (I forget his name) sneak into the machine to learn it's secrets while Jon Adams flirts with Val Altara.

SPOILER: Adams' second in command dies, but not before he explains the ultimate evil created comes from the id. This id monster is also what has been rebirthed from Morbius, who Morbius is subconsciously having kill the new discovery team that Adams heads up. The id monster has not been seen in thousands of years, until now. It took a special person and situation to recreate the id monster. And yes, just like the Doom, the is monster destroyed the planet (in this case) and it exploded. 

The thing about the id- the one of the three divisions of the psyche in psychoanalytic theory that is completely unconscious and is the source of psychic energy derived from instinctual needs and drives — compare ego, superego

This id idea also follows the idea of the dragon has three heads. In Latin, id means simply "it". Sigmund Freud brought the word into the modern vocabulary as the name of what Freud believed to be one of the three basic elements of the human personality, the other two being the ego and the superego. According to Freud, the id is the first of these to develop, and is the home of the body's basic instincts, particularly those involving sex and aggression. We see these instincts in Dany when she is with Drogo and their sex, and when makes demands of his bloodriders and Drogo is proud of her agression, and then when Dany instinctively knows how to hatch the dragon eggs. She is waking her id from stone.

Since the id lacks logic, reason, or even organization, it can contain conflicting impulses. Primitive in nature, it wants to be satisfied immediately. Although its workings are completely unconscious, Freud believed that its contents could be revealed in works of art, in slips of the tongue ("Freudian slips"), and in one's dreams. We see this id work in scenes like Daenerys has when she is at the "darkling stream". This darkling area is a negative place, and the scenes within the darkling stream are not things that are a positive for Dany. Almost warnings.

• ACOK/Dany IV:
  Then phantoms shivered through the murk, images in indigo. Viserys screamed as the molten gold ran down his cheeks and filled his mouth. A tall lord with copper skin and silver-gold hair stood beneath the banner of a fiery stallion, a burning city behind him. Rubies flew like drops of blood from the chest of a dying prince, and he sank to his knees in the water and with his last breath murmured a woman's name. . . . mother of dragons, daughter of death . . . Glowing like sunset, a red sword was raised in the hand of a blue-eyed king who cast no shadow. A cloth dragon swayed on poles amidst a cheering crowd. From a smoking tower, a great stone beast took wing, breathing shadow fire. . . . mother of dragons, slayer of lies . . . Her silver was trotting through the grass, to a darkling stream beneath a sea of stars. A corpse stood at the prow of a ship, eyes bright in his dead face, grey lips smiling sadly. A blue flower grew from a chink in a wall of ice, and filled the air with sweetness. . . . mother of dragons, bride of fire . . .
  Faster and faster the visions came, one after the other, until it seemed as if the very air had come alive. Shadows whirled and danced inside a tent, boneless and terrible. A little girl ran barefoot toward a big house with a red door. Mirri Maz Duur shrieked in the flames, a dragon bursting from her brow. Behind a silver horse the bloody corpse of a naked man bounced and dragged. A white lion ran through grass taller than a man. Beneath the Mother of Mountains, a line of naked crones crept from a great lake and knelt shivering before her, their grey heads bowed. Ten thousand slaves lifted bloodstained hands as she raced by on her silver, riding like the wind. "Mother!" they cried. "Mother, mother!" They were reaching for her, touching her, tugging at her cloak, the hem of her skirt, her foot, her leg, her breast. They wanted her, needed her, the fire, the life, and Dany gasped and opened her arms to give herself to them . . .
  • We know Dany is the mother of dragons because she, like Morbius, just rebirthed/awakened her three children.
  • And we know Dany is a bride of fire already because this is something she realizes in the Drogo funeral pyre.
    • She had sensed the truth of it long ago, Dany thought as she took a step closer to the conflagration, but the brazier had not been hot enough. The flames writhed before her like the women who had danced at her wedding, whirling and singing and spinning their yellow and orange and crimson veils, fearsome to behold, yet lovely, so lovely, alive with heat. Dany opened her arms to them, her skin flushed and glowing. This is a wedding, too, she thought. Mirri Maz Duur had fallen silent. The godswife thought her a child, but children grow, and children learn. (death pays for life, kill the girl and let the woman be born)

And George seems to be using this id/darkling plain concept for Tyrion as well. Curious Tyrion only has two heads in his dream, so maybe Tyrion is the second dragon rider?

• ADWD/Tyrion II:
  The wine, the food, the sun, the sway of the litter, the buzzing of the flies, all conspired to make Tyrion sleepy. So he slept, woke, drank. Illyrio matched him cup for cup. And as the sky turned a dusky purple, the fat man began to snore.
  That night Tyrion Lannister dreamed of a battle that turned the hills of Westeros as red as blood. He was in the midst of it, dealing death with an axe as big as he was, fighting side by side with Barristan the Bold and Bittersteel as dragons wheeled across the sky above them. In the dream he had two heads, both noseless. His father led the enemy, so he slew him once again. Then he killed his brother, Jaime, hacking at his face until it was a red ruin, laughing every time he struck a blow. Only when the fight was finished did he realize that his second head was weeping.

And the author has used this "darkling" stream idea before in another story of his in the "darkling plain", and there he uses the source of the info, which is a poem from Matthew Arnold called Dover Beach. Info here. Yes, George does use it by name in his other story.

• “I don’t,” I said. “Neither did Lya. Most Talents are atheists, you know. There was an experiment tried back on Old Earth fifty years ago. It was organized by a major Talent named Linnel, who was also devoutly religious. He thought that by using drugs, and linking together the minds of the world’s most potent Talents, he could reach something he called the Universal Yes-I-Live. Also known as God. The experiment was a dismal failure, but something happened. Linnel went mad, and the others came away with only a vision of a vast, dark, uncaring nothingness, a void without reason or form or meaning. Other Talents have felt the same way, and Normals too. Centuries ago there was a poet named Arnold, who wrote of a darkling plain. The poem’s in one of the old languages, but it’s worth reading. It shows—fear, I think. Something basic in man, some dread of being alone in the cosmos. Maybe it’s just fear of death, maybe it’s more. I don’t know. But it’s primal. All men are forever alone, but they don’t want to be. They’re always searching, trying to make contact, trying to reach others across the void. Some people never succeed, some break through occasionally. Lya and I were lucky. But it’s never permanent. In the end you’re alone again, back on the darkling plain. You see, Dino? Do you see?”

Anyway, when I first watched that movie I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was. MST3K hasn't even made fun of it!!! A tad 50's kitschy? Yes, but is that really such a bad thing

[Annalee]

7 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

The Forbidden Planet is said to be George R.R Martin's favorite movie.  I propose that the plot of the movie may have implications for how the author set up the destruction of Valyria.  Here is a link for more information on this excellent Scifi movie:  [SPOILER WARNING IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE]

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049223/?ref_=nv_sr_1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet

If you have not seen this classic scifi and wish to see it, please do not proceed further.  I will spoil the plot for you.

  Reveal hidden contents

In the movie, a super advanced race called the Krell disappeared on the eve of their greatest achievement.  They created a machine that can give them whatever they wanted.  Their own inner desires, the monsters from the id, caused their destruction.  They destroyed each other.  

The Valyrians built their city in the proximity of the Fourteen Flames.  We have been told that "fire is power" and the Valyrians used the fires of the volcanoes to perform magnificent magic.  They were also mining the precious metals around the volcanoes.  We know the mining activities were vast and on a scale beyond what goes on in even Casterly Rock.  The Valyrians were mining deeply using powerful magic and endless supply of labor.   Either their powerful magic got away from them and opened the taps, so to speak, or they dug too deep.

A better example is Sodom.  The Targaryens, the heroes in this story, were saved by the Gods.  They sent a vision of warning to Daenys.  Lord Aenar Targaryen, the equivalent of Lot, took his family to safety.  In the biblical tale, Lot's wife looked back and was turned into a pilar of salt.  Notice how the Targaryens warn themselves not to look back?  I have to wonder why it was that the Targaryens never tried to rebuild the Valyrian Empire.  Aegon even sided against Volantis when that city tried to rebuild the empire.  Recall the scene in Dany's dreams in aGoT, running towards the red door (the place of safety).  If I look back, I am lost.  The Targaryens had more discipline than Lot's wife and therefore survived the doom.  The Targaryens were meant to build another kingdom in the west rather than rebuild Valyria. 

ASOIAF is primarily the story of the Targaryen family.  They were meant to survive.  This is their story.