I don't care for the Zombie Apocalypse.

[kissdbyfire]

13 hours ago, Tyrion1991 said:

 

You mean he has been misleading the audience and then dumps a load of info which contradicts all of the Others behaviour up until this point? 

 

That's absolutely not what I meant. 

[Makk]

38 minutes ago, snow is the man said:

to be fair though it's implied that they are the big bad and want to kill every human. I don't see anything to suggest otherwise

I think that they have been implied to be an extremely dangerous threat. But wanting to kill every human or their motivation for wanting to do so is an assumption. The point I was making, this is not a mindless zombie apocalypse. There is almost certainly an intelligence behind it, and that means there is a motivation which hasn't been revealed yet.

[snow is the man]

Just now, Makk said:

I think that they have been implied to be an extremely dangerous threat. But wanting to kill every human or their motivation for wanting to do so is an assumption. The point I was making, this is not a mindless zombie apocalypse. There is almost certainly an intelligence behind it, and that means there is a motivation which hasn't been revealed yet.

Oh I don't think there is no intelligence behind it. In the books the WW are made to be like a seperate people. They have their own language if I remember right and are able to work together and are individuals if what we saw in the first prolouge is true. I think that there end goal however is to kill every human. We may not no there motivations but the end result is the same. And the why is a big deal I am not denying that.

 

And it may be an assumption but I think it's all but guianteed to go that way.

[Tyrion1991]

1 hour ago, Makk said:

I think that they have been implied to be an extremely dangerous threat. But wanting to kill every human or their motivation for wanting to do so is an assumption. The point I was making, this is not a mindless zombie apocalypse. There is almost certainly an intelligence behind it, and that means there is a motivation which hasn't been revealed yet.

 

Hitler and Stalin had motivation. That doesn't mean those motives are morally grey or can be labelled evil.

Lets say they are doing this to stop a second Doom. That the Others are merely reacting to the return of Fire Magic and seek to kill Dany and her Dragons. Wouldn't they just tell other people that was their intention? Make common cause with humans since most people aren't aligned with Fire Magic or Dany. If they haven't tried to communicate their motivations or use non violent means then it means they obviously don't care how many people die in their attacks. Which means they are not acting to preserve life but for Alien reasons connected to some balance of magic which we do not remotely care about. If you can live alongside dragons but Others attack you for no reason then people will side with the Dragons.

 

See GRRM cannot turn around and say his characters were unwilling to hear the Others out or were prejudiced. That would imply communication. Which is nonexistent. It is evil to attack somebody for no reason and not explain your reasons. It means you never contemplated a non violent or diplomatic solution.

[Red Man Racey]

11 hours ago, Tyrion1991 said:

 

Hitler and Stalin had motivation. That doesn't mean those motives are morally grey or can be labelled evil.

Lets say they are doing this to stop a second Doom. That the Others are merely reacting to the return of Fire Magic and seek to kill Dany and her Dragons. Wouldn't they just tell other people that was their intention? Make common cause with humans since most people aren't aligned with Fire Magic or Dany. If they haven't tried to communicate their motivations or use non violent means then it means they obviously don't care how many people die in their attacks. Which means they are not acting to preserve life but for Alien reasons connected to some balance of magic which we do not remotely care about. If you can live alongside dragons but Others attack you for no reason then people will side with the Dragons.

 

See GRRM cannot turn around and say his characters were unwilling to hear the Others out or were prejudiced. That would imply communication. Which is nonexistent. It is evil to attack somebody for no reason and not explain your reasons. It means you never contemplated a non violent or diplomatic solution.

I think you meant YOU do not remotely care about. Do not presume to speak for an entire audience simply because you find a particular aspect of a story uninteresting.

Additionally, we have no evidence that communication is even possible between humans and Others. If anything, we have evidence to the contrary - the language/laughter/speech (or whatever it was) of the Others is said to sound like cracking ice. It's doubtful that any meaningful dialogue could be accomplished with this limitation. Furthermore, we have little and less information about the first Long Night - what precipitated it, who were the aggressors, what were the motivations for each group. Given that history is written by the victor, it's entirely possible that humans initiated that conflict and the Others were reacting to human aggression (I don't believe this, I'm simply pointing out that we have no reliable information to determine what happened or why). Until GRRM provides more information about the motivation for the Others we cannot make any real determination of where the Others exist on the morality spectrum or if they are independent of the morality spectrum like other forces of nature.

[Tyrion1991]

So coming for revenge against humans who died millennia ago is sympathetic? 

Close Encounters of the Third Kind. You don't need to speak to communicate. You certainly don't attack on site.

No I don't. Why should we as an audience rank the lives of people higher than an abstract thing like "fire and ice must be balanced"? People's lives are more important than some ice spirits being ratty over Danys dragons. 

All of the theories that the Others being good guys fundamentally depends on them not invading Westeros and the plot requires them to invade Westeros and kill loads of people. At which point I do not care what reason GRRM conjures from the ether; nothing can justify that. It would take an obscenely contrived set of circumstances to make this app some misunderstanding when one group refuses to communicate. 

[Tucu]

4 minutes ago, Tyrion1991 said:

So coming for revenge against humans who died millennia ago is sympathetic? 

Close Encounters of the Third Kind. You don't need to speak to communicate. You certainly don't attack on site.

No I don't. Why should we as an audience rank the lives of people higher than an abstract thing like "fire and ice must be balanced"? People's lives are more important than some ice spirits being ratty over Danys dragons. 

All of the theories that the Others being good guys fundamentally depends on them not invading Westeros and the plot requires them to invade Westeros and kill loads of people. At which point I do not care what reason GRRM conjures from the ether; nothing can justify that. It would take an obscenely contrived set of circumstances to make this app some misunderstanding when one group refuses to communicate. 

Humans fighting will do most of the killing as they have done for the whole story. This time they will fight for food and shelter from the Winds of Winter.

[Red Man Racey]

2 hours ago, Tyrion1991 said:

So coming for revenge against humans who died millennia ago is sympathetic? 

Close Encounters of the Third Kind. You don't need to speak to communicate. You certainly don't attack on site.

No I don't. Why should we as an audience rank the lives of people higher than an abstract thing like "fire and ice must be balanced"? People's lives are more important than some ice spirits being ratty over Danys dragons. 

All of the theories that the Others being good guys fundamentally depends on them not invading Westeros and the plot requires them to invade Westeros and kill loads of people. At which point I do not care what reason GRRM conjures from the ether; nothing can justify that. It would take an obscenely contrived set of circumstances to make this app some misunderstanding when one group refuses to communicate. 

I'm pretty sure every reader has a right to their own opinion of what does and does not matter, what is or is not important. Because, you know:

Quote

Its called an opinion and I am allowed to like certain aspects of the series and dislike others.

Or did you just mean that YOU get to have an opinion and everybody else needs to fall in lock-step with what you think is important in the story?

Personally, I do think that the mystery behind the Others is important. I am very much looking forward to getting more, and more reliable, information about the Long Night and what actually happened - what the Others' motives are. Is Old Nan right? Do they simply hate warmth and the living? Or is there something else going on that we don't see yet?

[TheThreeEyedCow]

They're not zombies. There are similarities but they're more than zombies. Remember, 'Ice preserves' so as the above comments suggest, there is still a remnant of the original person in there somewhere. Go read the Varamyr prologue for ADWD. 

And even if they were, they're not the main threat. It's the cold that truly bites and I bet it's going to kill more people than any Whites do.

[Ghost+Nymeria4Eva]

18 hours ago, Tyrion1991 said:

Lets say they are doing this to stop a second Doom. That the Others are merely reacting to the return of Fire Magic and seek to kill Dany and her Dragons. Wouldn't they just tell other people that was their intention? Make common cause with humans since most people aren't aligned with Fire Magic or Dany. If they haven't tried to communicate their motivations or use non violent means then it means they obviously don't care how many people die in their attacks.

The Others return before the return of fire magic and before dragons are born. WW are present in the GoT prologue, and when we go to the Wall we know that many ranger parties have disappeared before. 

The Others are a completely different species. It will be like humans and dragons trying to communicate. 

Anyway, there could be a way to communicate with them because there are legends of human interactions with the Others, like Night's King. 

[Tyrion1991]

On ‎22‎/‎09‎/‎2017 at 2:35 PM, Red Man Racey said:

 

Personally, I do think that the mystery behind the Others is important. I am very much looking forward to getting more, and more reliable, information about the Long Night and what actually happened - what the Others' motives are. Is Old Nan right? Do they simply hate warmth and the living? Or is there something else going on that we don't see yet?

Why should I care? Personally I think its cheap and misleading if he did that. Any writer can with-hold information or mislead the audience as they control what I am reading. I am not going to be morally challenged if Old Nan is wrong. I don't care if Ice Spirits actually aren't evil. Which would might have a point if they LOOKED EVIL, but they don't; so it would literally just be misleading and a huge red herring. The only reason I believe the Others are dangerous is because I am told they are dangerous repeatedly. It is not because of some twilight level "Vampires are people too and you're prejudiced". 

Lets make a comparison. The Giants. Inhuman, barely speak and initially hostile to the heroes. First we see Ygritte telling Jon that they have a culture and are with the wildlings trying to escape. Then we hear her sing a sweet song about how they are being driven to extinction by the wiles of man. We then even have scenes like when some of Jons friend is killed in the gate and he dies in that giants embrace; symbolism and all that. In fact a lot of this comes before any fighting at the wall, so we really are told what they are about and why we should care and not just take a one dimensional approach. 

So to me, that is how GRRM would as a writer approach making a morally grey fantasy "monster". 

You don't have them raise an Undead army, breach the wall and invade Westeros; without any justification. Humanity has done nothing to the Others. With the Giants and the Children GRRM made it extremely clear that humans were driving them to extinction and that this was a source of conflict. He has not even implied that with the Others. Even if you insist this is a mystery there are nowhere near enough hints or breadcrumbs to imply that they are. If they indeed are, then I don't see why they would invade Westeros. So why is he not following the pattern of the Children and the Giants?

I mean wouldn't it make more sense to introduce the Others as more nuanced like he did with the Lannisters and involve them in the plot rather than a "surprise twist"? Like, I dunno, the last Other is about to be killed and then starts babbling about how they saw a vision of Danys dragon destroying them and launched a pre-emptive attack on humanity. "Oh no, it was all a horrible misunderstanding". Well in that case they'd be so stupid that they deserve to die. All those people they would have killed out of fear and ignorance. 

 

Plus, I think the politics of all the Houses is a lot more interesting than the invincible plot device zombie horde that doesn't need to think or be clever to win. What makes Neds death good, is that GRRM makes the point that it doesn't matter if you are a good man. If you make bad calls or decisions then you will die. It is not the same thing to just get a bunch of monsters, make them more powerful than the heroes and have them win. The only reason the Others will win is because they have the deck stacked in their favour. That conflict does interest me whatsoever. There is no moral to it. There is no nuance to it. It is simply nihilism. How is it our characters fault that all the dragons died in the Doom long before they were born? Imagine if the Others had invaded during the Freehold? But yeah, I don't want fantasy walking dead. 

Finally Undead suck as fantasy enemies. They have no character. No personality. Just the same shambling corpses I have seen in countless films and TV shows only without the thematic "virus" elements. Its the most vanilla enemy he could have picked.

Plus can somebody really explain what cold magic has to do with the undead? Really jarring. 

 

[Castellan]

On 19 September 2017 at 5:57 AM, Tyrion1991 said:

 

More specifically, there is a major disconnect between one of the main themes of the novel and what I as the reader enjoy about the novel. I am absolutely enthralled and fascinated by the Game of Thrones. But, they keep telling me that none of that is important and that I should focus on the generic zombies that are going to kill everybody. Plus, once winter does come and we get the apocalypse, all of the politics will end and the story becomes a very basic question of survival.

....

Plus GRRM has avoided explaining the metaphysical elements of his world, this makes the conflict with the Others not make a lot of sense thematically. 

I'd say the 'Game of Thrones' theme you talk about is derived from historical fiction rather than fantasy fiction (granted they spring from the same well) and I too preferred the parts of the series I can read as historical fiction - but freed by fantasy from having to stick to historic facts. Its not that I am particularly interested in the power plays, but I am more interested in the human drama and the human dilemmas of the characters. I found Bran and three eyed crow Celtic stuff intensely irritating and preferred the scenes in the south where people do not believe in grumkins and snarks. Given this, I actually prefer the Others just as a mysterious evil force rather than being fleshed out.

"Plus GRRM has avoided explaining the metaphysical elements of his world, this makes the conflict with the Others not make a lot of sense thematically. "

I think it will make more sense in retrospect and as we see things from various characters viewpoints it means that this stuff sneaks up on us the way it sneaks up on them. Clearly is a world where 'magic' is forgotten but is about to be resurgent blah blah blah.

 

 

[Wild Bill]

I have posted elsewhere that significant change to Westeros should be akin to the Black Death of medieval Europe. I view the Zombie Apocalypse as the means to kill off 30-50% of the population leading to "some" social change. Therefor, I expect some kind of "explanation" to justify the deus ex machina zombies, while leaving swathes of long-term characters dead, and having us readers "happy" despite devastation, waste, carnage, (and omg Jon and Dany die, albeit heroically).

NB, Jon and Dany are not exactly my favourite characters, but are so fore-tolled. I think they must die. Dany is easy, we already know that the dragons are beasts that eat whatever they can take (a shepherds lamb, or children, or whatever), and Dany = dragons. Exuent Dany. Jon is already dead... He's probably destined for some melodramatic reprise, prior to re-death.

Anyway, I do think the Zombie Apocalypse will have some good rational behind it, and considerable consequences...

Cheers,

[falcotron]

14 hours ago, Wild Bill said:

I have posted elsewhere that significant change to Westeros should be akin to the Black Death of medieval Europe.

Yes, the series of changes hitting all at once are pretty much the same as the Great Crisis of the late medieval period, especially in England—they've got a great famine followed by a little ice age, a religion-driven peasant revolt, a War of the Roses, and an international war across the English Channel/Narrow Sea… No plague yet, but JonConn could be carrying Greyscale, or Dany's troops could be carrying the Pale Mare or other diseases most of Westeros hasn't built up an immunity to.

And there's a good argument that the Great Crisis was at least necessary if not sufficient to lead to the Renaissance.

But the Great Crisis took place over 200+ years, not 4 years. Killing 30% of the people in a single generation wouldn't have nearly the same effect in forcing the collapse of feudalism.

I think GRRM ran into a similar problem with TPatQ. He sped the Anarchy up from 18 years to 18 months, and everything works surprisingly well… until you get to the end. Which is why the last third of the war is crammed into a single "and then some other stuff happened" paragraph. I'm sure GRRM will eventually find a way to make it work when he releases Fire & Blood, but it obviously wasn't as easy as writing the rest of it. And writing the aftermath of the Battle for the Dawn 2.0 might cause similar problems if he's expecting it to be the right kind of catastrophe.

[Wild Bill]

7 hours ago, falcotron said:

No plague yet, but JonConn could be carrying Greyscale, or Dany's troops could be carrying the Pale Mare or other diseases most of Westeros hasn't built up an immunity to.

Many in this thread haven't thought of the sad reality of smallpox on native American populations (much worse than the plague in europe) and whether viral infections have a point or a thematic device to those that are actually suffering from it. I'm not trying to be a downer - we are observers of what happens, and I can imagine a Zombie Apocalypse, but, again, with some explanation.

[off topic BTW, I've misplaced a brilliant book I had that was a survey of diseases, epidemics ,and pandemics. I can't remember the author or title. I did post about it on the Paradox game forum a long time ago (Victoria being the game). Maybe I'll look it up.]

[Edit: and more off topic. It would be interesting to examine the Westeros prehistory to see if there is analogy between the populations of the Americas not having immunity to the diseases of the Europeans]

[falcotron]

2 minutes ago, Wild Bill said:

Many in this thread haven't thought of the sad reality of smallpox on native American populations (much worse than the plague in europe) and whether viral infections have a point or a thematic device to those that are actually suffering from it. I'm not trying to be a downer - we are observers of what happens, and I can imagine a Zombie Apocalypse, but, again, with some explanation.

Yeah, I think the idea of 100,000 people from Essos showing up in (and besieging cities in…) Westeros should be scary as hell. I doubt most Westerosi had any immunity to the Pale Mare and other Essosi diseases, and they've got 100,000 or more people coming to besiege their cities. That really can't turn out well…

But I think GRRM will see it more like the Black Plague in England (which killed 30-40% of the population and left them poised for the Great Crisis) than like smallpox in eastern Canada (which killed 80-90% of the people and led to the almost total collapse of their civilizations within a generation, before they even started major dealings with European colonies). Which won't be quite as much of a downer. England (and, even more so, Scandinavia) ended up mostly better off after the 14th century Plague than before it.

[Wild Bill]

10 minutes ago, falcotron said:

Yeah, I think the idea of 100,000 people from Essos showing up in (and besieging cities in…) Westeros should be scary as hell. I doubt most Westerosi had any immunity to the Pale Mare and other Essosi diseases, and they've got 100,000 or more people coming to besiege their cities. That really can't turn out well…

But I think GRRM will see it more like the Black Plague in England (which killed 30-40% of the population and left them poised for the Great Crisis) than like smallpox in eastern Canada (which killed 80-90% of the people and led to the almost total collapse of their civilizations within a generation, before they even started major dealings with European colonies). Which won't be quite as much of a downer. England (and, even more so, Scandinavia) ended up mostly better off after the 14th century Plague than before it.

I agree with any likely GRRM intention.

Though I wonder about herd immunity. Essos and Westeros do have a lot of intercourse via trade and such, precluding the equivalent Small Pox scenario. On the other hand the Pale Mare is maybe new and just as deadly to Westeros as Essos as you mention.

[falcotron]

Just now, Wild Bill said:

I agree with any likely GRRM intention.

Though I wonder about herd immunity. Essos and Westeros do have a lot of intercourse via trade and such, precluding the equivalent Small Pox scenario. On the other hand the Pale Mare is maybe new and just as deadly to Westeros as Essos as you mention.

I think realistically they should have very little immunity. They're a feudal economy where very few people are involved in international trade, and they're ridiculously over-urbanized.

That being said, GRRM has given enough little enough detail that I won't complain if he decides to make it less devastating than that, and I have confidence that he'd be able to pull off a plausible plague story that's no worse than Sweden that doesn't contradict anything we've been told. Which is what I expect him to do. (I hope he'll make it the Pale Mare or something rather than Greyscale, but then Greyscale is a fantasy disease caused by a curse, so it can be a little unrealistic if he wants…)

[Wild Bill]

5 minutes ago, falcotron said:

I think realistically they should have very little immunity. They're a feudal economy where very few people are involved in international trade, and they're ridiculously over-urbanized.

That being said, GRRM has given enough little enough detail that I won't complain if he decides to make it less devastating than that, and I have confidence that he'd be able to pull off a plausible plague story that's no worse than Sweden that doesn't contradict anything we've been told. Which is what I expect him to do. (I hope he'll make it the Pale Mare or something rather than Greyscale, but then Greyscale is a fantasy disease caused by a curse, so it can be a little unrealistic if he wants…)

Ooh, a quick check in Wikipedia is that the plague is bacterial, not viral, as is smallpox. Are there any descriptions of the White Walkers, that imply any bubos or nasty rashes? The show version could be construed as rashes (though the literature doesn't indicate a bluing of the eyes), maybe...

[falcotron]

51 minutes ago, Wild Bill said:

Ooh, a quick check in Wikipedia is that the plague is bacterial, not viral, as is smallpox. Are there any descriptions of the White Walkers, that imply any bubos or nasty rashes? The show version could be construed as rashes (though the literature doesn't indicate a bluing of the eyes), maybe...

Well, obviously the Blue Plague is different from the Black Plague, of course.

The Green Plague, meanwhile, is apparently a term for a zombie virus invented by the game Plague, Inc.

The White Plague is also bacterial—it was the name for tuberculosis when it became epidemic in the 19th century.

The Red Plague is neither bacterial nor viral—it's the name for when copper corrodes when put next to corroded silver or when plated with silver. Some American right-wingers use the term to refer to third-world Communism, but I think that's also neither viral or bacterial.

I don't know if there's a prionic plague that has a nice color name to go with it. Mad cows don't really change color when they go mad.