divica

He said that there will be diferences. He didn t say it will be only about secondary characters… The fact that he then talks about book only characters was to give exemples without clearly stating that x character will have a diferent fate in the book and show. And you really think that people's reactions to this ending won t affect him? that when writting he won t end up making changes because he can t make certain things make sense? I think we just have to look at the 5 year gap to see that not everything grrm plans ends up happening.

Personally I kind of hate most of those endings wether I like the character or not. And I really hate the tragedy understones in danny and jon's endings.

He is the one who said several times that he hasn t seen the last season. He is the one that after the show ended started to do damage control saying his ending will have diferences and that winds will be released within the year... And before you start saying he was only refering to minor characters… He has never expressed so clearly that the ending of the show and the books will be diferent as he did in his post. In regards to ending in 2 books… I have thought for several years that winds will be 2 volumes released at the same time. He had hundreds of pages from dance and feast included in the book! With nearly all the characters from the 2 previous books I have no idea how the story is suposed to advance if it doesn t ocupy 2 books… And if winds are 2 books then he can finish it in a dream of Spring… Otherwise with the pace we have seen in the published chapters and the events that must happen he will need 10 books….

You can t have the books being completly diferent from the show and grrm saying it is a faithfull adaptation… It doesn t work both ways. And there is a lot of things in the show that we know will happen in the books… Like jon and danny meeting each other for example... And I highly doubt a single character will have the credit of defeating the others. There will be several characters that will be seen as heroes of the long night… And having a war hero become king is exactly what grrm doesn t like about LotR. He wants to know how aragorn rules! Not that he is a good ruler because he is a hero... IF bran becomes king it won t be simply because he has powers... My hope is that sansa ends as lady of the vale and jon as KitN with the new north being composed of wildlings, Giants, skagosi, clansmen, cragnonmen, iron born, bear islanders… Basically a bunch of savages that don t fit with Southern politics. I think it could fit with what happened in the show… I don t think sansa fits in a magical and savage north... Dont Forget that he gave that interview before he saw the last season. I think it is safer to say that the first 7 seasons are similar to the books (he even seems to have most of winds written that should end somewhere in the beguining of season 7). In regards to season 8... I agree there must be similarities to what he has planned. But a lot of what happens there just doesn t fit in the story… If he is really hell bent in ending the story that way we will either never see the end of the books or people will hate them…

They also saud that there is still a NW even though the others are defeated and the wildlings are friendly. What does the NW do? hang out on the Wall? Plot their revenge against the kingdoms that sent them to the Wall?

The point was proving that he could be king without being on the IT... But I agree that who ends in the IT seems to be too important to change. Unless grrm changes his mind with time, sees people's reactions or when he is actually writting the story decides it doesn t fit like the 5 year gap... And don t Forget that despite still having 2 books left if winds is similar to season 6 and beguining of season 7 of the show then grrm will have the same problems as the show did to sell us this ending. Besides the fact that a lot of people don t seem to like it...

Not really. Bran by being a greenseer becomes the leader of a group of people… Isn t that the definition of a king?

The greenseers are the leaders of the cotf… They might even be the leaders of the hardcore followers of the old gods… Like an independent faction that the wildlings go to when they want to setle disputes… So he is kind of a king...

It makes sense to have bran have visions in that cave about the past or events that are happening now and then talking with the cotf and bloodraven about sending dreams to the right people so that they can defeat the others and help his familly survive. THAT is the whole point of him becoming the 3ec! Learning and using the powers of the 3ec. And he can do that much better inside the cave than anywhere else.

Neither jon arryn, ned or hoster tully have any afection for joffrey. However they would have followed him simply because he was robert's heir. They already gave their vows to follow robb. Them following his heir is a result of the vows they made to robb. The people still resisting in the riverlands used direwolves standards (if I remember right)... And with uncat and the blackfish it makes sense that they will try to make the riverlands follow robb's heir in order to continue the fight. And I doubt that the riverlords prefer a targaryen to a stark...

All kingdoms also swore fealty to robert and danny thinks she has a claim to the IT... Given the bad relations between the riverlands and the lannisters under the right conditions they would honnor the will...

Actually, with robb's will legitimazing jon bran isn t the heir... As robb's heir jon is the one that is in control of the north and whatever domain's robb had in the riverlands (at the moment I am not sure how far his kingdom went).

To be fair, she traveled within the riverlands in the worse possible time. It isn t really fair to compare her interaction with the people of the riverlands with the people in braavos. And I agree that arya won t be taking a ship to make a travel nobody has returned from so far… She isn t a sailor lol… And if one of her familly members ends up in a position of power she will have entertainment for the rest of her life acting as his/her spy wherever she wants.

Arya's story probably will be related to the interests of the faceless in the citadel at first and then either protecting or killing someone with her faceless training. And we have no idea how her identity crisis arc is going to end up… If she decides to be arya stark she won t leave westeros…

Honestly, these last books have been so focused about how some characters rule and the lessons they need to learn that who ends up in the throne should be someone we have seen become a ruler. Otherwise it will make dance and feast 2 stupid books… At present moment only danny or jon (ignoring cersei and euron) would be satisfying. With winds we might add faegon to the list… To me sansa seems to be leading to a behind the scenes leader like LF but I could be wrong. I have no idea how we will have a ruling arcs for other characters...

Why does this seem natural? Cersei isn t an atractive prospect for euron… First all her children must die before she becomes interesting. Then if she looses the aliance with the tyrells she will only have a depleated army. Next problem is that nobody will accept euron and cersei in the books. If we already think cersei is doomed then if we add euron the smallfolk and the faith will never accept them. Then Euron seems to want more than material power in his wife… He wants magic! Honestly, the only way I see euron on the IT is if he is a skinchanger and steals faegons body. Nobody will ever support euron as king for a long time… And another thing to take into account is that euron won t be cersei's errand boy as he is in the series… I don t see how cersei can help euron achieve any of his objectives… we don t even know if she can still have kids... edit: I don t even know how loyal the lannister army will be to cersei if she loses KL (and even if she keeps it I think there will be problems, bringing euron into the equation will only make things worse).

The real question is "do you think there will only be 3 dragons?". Because unless the dragons are unstopable and can easilly defeat the others 3 dragons aren t enough. Does anyone think that countless others can t kill a dragon? That if a dragon gets wightified there isn t a high chance the others will also die? And I highly doubt that moqorro will be the final owner of any dragon. He might control 1 for a while but I doubt it will last.

I am no expert in that period of story. But as I said earlier the pope's power is a very special one. Nobody would act agains the pope because of their religion. It was a taboo to opose him. Then if he needed support he could use the help of other rulers just because they were christians. In adition, if I am not mistaken the pope was only the leader of rome and the other city states had their own rullers. Another thing to take into account is that it was the cardinals that chosed the pope and not the powerful families of that time.

Yeah... After reading the first chapter it is obvious that people would accept an 8 year old Stark kid without claim to the IT as king... We don t even need to read the rest of the books and know what happens to the boy...

Book stannis wanted to give castles of the NW to his southerns and winterfell to the karstarks… The north won t support him with him doing things like this... And all the people you mentioned don t support stannis. Lady stoneheart and the riverlands would support a stark because of kin or because he is robb's heir and LS knows that robb named jon… White harbor won t support stannis without rickon and he looks very far away. Most people believe the reeds know about robbs will. Then robb's plan was exactly the oposite you are talking about. He wanted to go back north... And the divided north is because some people will want to follow robb's will, some the boltons, some rickon and some stannis. And stannis can t unite the north! I would bet that the clans will abandon him now that farya is safe and he seems doomed… And even if they don t leave him now they will after winterfell is taken because they didn t swore themselves to stannis. They joined him to save farya and kill boltons and so far they have come to dislike stannis and his southerns that worship r'hllor and burn people alive…

But in westeros the lords already have a lot of influence on the crown. Most kingdoms operate almost independently only paying taxes to the king, answering his call to war and obeying the laws… In westeros the kings even have to constantly forge aliances to hape the support of the high lords to make certain decisions… The closer you look the less absolute power the kings have... No. The wars started because stannis spread the word that joff was a bastard and the north revolted because joff killed ned. As long as there are lords with thousands of soldiers that answer to them there can t be diplomacy in westeros. It doesn t make sense… And even if a council choses a king it doesn t mean that if a person some lords like more apears they won t support him... The only thing this method of chosing a king offers is a sucession crisis with a potential war each time a king dies… IT would be much better to have a sistem similar to the Iron islands where the nobles can chose the next king among the descendents of the dead king. It should garante that someone like joff doesn t become king and at the same time minize the risk of war because normally siblings don t go to war between themselves...

The roman empire had a republic phase and a empire phase. I think you are talking about the republic phase where there were wars, poiltical plots, bribes and whatever to win elections into positions of power (and I am not sure how romans rose in the military). But in this phase they didn t have a single leader. However, in the empire phase the emperors chosed their heirs that took their position after they died. The papacy is a more interesting example. However the pope's power is a very special kind of power. First, I think there was a certain taboo about going against the pope because of religion. Then the pope didn t use his armies to impose his will, the cristians would do as he said...

Which midle age history are you talking about? Because I know of no monarchy where the kings didn t have heirs to take their place. If you are talking about monarchies where the king doesn t have absolute powers they did exist. However you are ignoring the major problems with the sistem the show established. Everytime a king dies there would be potential to start a war. As long as close to half the kingdoms suported 1 person and the other kingdoms supported another person then they would need to fight in order to decide who would be king. Then no king would be able to trust the lords because it might be better for them if he dies and they can chose someone that would be more beneficial for them. Given that the kings are chosen from the powerful families they would always favour some families over other families. This would lead to war… And I am sure you can think of more problems with this sistem. It is very flawed! The sistem of the iron islands is much better!

Or lysa didn t want to have kids with jon arryn and took something to kill the babies. I don t think there is a problem with robin getting phisical better. The problem is that the kid has mental issues that would take years to cure...

With lisa dead if grrm wants he can have people toughen up robin. Otherwise just marry sansa to Harry... It is kind of indiferent….