The Bard of Banefort

So long story short, even in Westeros, murdering your spouse is a uniquely shitty thing to do. Isn’t that convention this week? Maybe they’ll announce Snow.

Fireball forced his wife to join the silent sisters so that he could become a kingsguard. Then he helped lead the Blackfyre rebellion after Daeron picked someone else.

Maybe this is more of a fantasy thing, but the royal family resides permanently in one castle in ASOIAF, the Red Keep. Was there any kingdom in our world where the royal family had a permanent home like that?

In the books, has any nobleman other than Maegor killed or been accused of killing his wife? Even all-around asshole Fireball didn’t murder his wife when he decided to get rid of her.

I wonder if the show is going to spread the war out to span several years? Aegon needs to be old enough to at least understand what’s happening when Rhaenyra is killed, and right now he’s a toddler.

It sounds like Egg changed the law allowing a noble to cut off the hand of someone who struck them, since Jaime mentioned that Cersei wanted to bring it back after Arya’s fight with Joffrey by the Trident. He probably also enacted a law against forcing untrained peasants to engage in combat, since that was a big concern of his in The Sworn Sword.

Audible is having a big sale through the 29th. If you go on their website, you’ll see it.

Knowing the story of the Black Brides, I’m genuinely confused as to why Henry VIII, after Jane Seymour’s death, didn’t seek out a young widow who had already given birth to a son before. Obviously it doesn’t guarantee any future sons (especially considering Henry’s own health problems) but it seems like it would be common sense from a sixteenth-century perspective. Did any other kings ever deliberately marry a widow for this reason?

The reverse is true too. In no world were Jaehaerys I (a third-born son), Viserys II (fifth-born son), or Maekar (fourth-born son) supposed to ascend the throne, but they all did well once they did. George seems to like these tropes. At the same time, I don’t know if we’re supposed to see Aegon V as a bad king. He’s never referred to as one, unlike the other kings you mentioned.

I’ll give you Larra/Daenaera, but HOTD added Rhea’s murder knowing how wife-murder is viewed by a modern audience. The showrunners wouldn’t have been so surprised that people still like Daemon if they hadn’t intended it that way. And I still think Daemon choking Rhaenyra was in character. Even in that shot of him from the wedding that all the shippers love, he’s holding her by the neck—a sign of possession. As her husband, he has authority over her now that he didn’t as her uncle.

Even if it was self-defense, it still should have haunted him. Rhea’s murder had no lasting effect (yet) but Daemon remained a man who would abuse his wife on a moment’s notice. Rhaenyra isn’t his perfect soulmate, she didn’t “fix” him. Their destined Valyrian supremacist lovematch was a lie. (I also find it noteworthy that the one who carried on the Targaryen line, Viserys II, was married to a woman from another country, even if Lys is also Valyrian. Incest did not save the Targaryens after they lost their dragons).

Man, I can’t tell you how much I wish there were more formal holidays in ASOIAF. It would be especially cool to see what kind of pagan holidays the North celebrates. Imagine some kind of solar eclipse holiday during a Reek chapter, or Sansa observing one of the holidays in secret in ACOK. There has been some renewed brouhaha online about Matt Smith claiming at a convention that he and Emma were surprised by the choking scene, but honestly, I respect the writers more for including it. I’ve said it before: there’s no coming back from intentionally murdering your wife. If they had Daemon be a loving and unproblematic husband to Rhaenyra, it would have been like how GOT conveniently forgot about Tyrion killing Shae. That has to be reflected on the character going forward.

Reading this book, along with a few others about the Middle-Ages, the stigma against bastards seems to be much greater than it was in real life, as is the kinslaying taboo. Paradoxically, Westeros comes across as much less religious than medieval Europe was. There are remarkably few royal mistresses and recognized royal bastards in ASOIAF, but after looking at some timelines of French and English monarchs, it looks like they don’t live as long either lol. Most kings ruled for decades; in ASOIAF, few make it to twenty years.

I’m not sure what they were going for with Daemon. It sounds like they edited the final product to make Daemon less gray and more of an outright villain. The showrunners seemed upset that some people were trying to make him out to be a better person than he was. I imagine that’s quite common for storytellers. GRRM clearly resents how much fans dislike Catelyn, or sympathize with Theon, or romanticize Jaime and the Hound (even though he’s given the last three all some variation of a redemption arc). I think people prefer Daemon because of his swagger and because of the weird cult around Matt Smith. People love Aemond for his swagger too. The funny thing is, I’d say that Aegon’s actor might be the best-looking in real life, but he carries himself in a much more pathetic way as Aegon.

I started reading When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman, which is about the Anarchy. GRRM has said he’s a fan of hers, so it wouldn’t surprise me if he read and was influenced by her. I can already see some of the similarities between characters, but one big difference is that Stephen does have a lot of good qualities, which makes me wish even more that the show made Aegon a lovable loser rather than an outright degenerate. Come to think of it, that’s sort of what Androw Farman was like: a lovable loser who eventually turned cruel and murderous. I like the changes the show made to Aemond and Helaena, but I think they dropped the ball with Aegon.

The whole point of marriage is that it’s public. It doesn’t make sense within this feudal world for Cregan to father a legitimate Targaryen heir and then have it never brought up again. The Starks would have capitalized on that connection as much as the Velaryons and Baratheons did. On a side note, I’m pretty sure that R+L=J is supposed to be significant in part because no northerners ever married into the royal family before. . . but this is somewhat undercut by having never had the Ironborn marry into the family either. (Just musing.)

The show has its own canon though. They added all the stuff about the prophecy and the dagger, so it’s not that unlikely that they’d make more changes from the books. HBO is probably also looking to retcon S8 in whatever way they can.

They’ll probably instantly fall in love, with him sadly telling her that he’s promised to another, and they’ll have sex before he says goodbye forever. There’s a theory that I find likely, which posits that Sara will die while secretly giving birth to his bastard daughter, which Cregan will cover up somehow and probably betroth to his own son, thus fulfilling the pact and making Arya and Bran descendants of the Targaryens. As I’ve said before, I expect this show to get really weird.

It’s mentioned in TWOIAF that Viserys wanted Aegon to do more PR but he refused.

Yeah, having him be driven by a weird obsession with Alicent rather than simply being a psychopath would have made for a more interesting subplot. Especially since this show seems willing to lean into the soapiness.

Could you provide the link?

I kind of wish they made Larys less of an outright psycho and more someone with a genuine, if creepy, devotion to Alicent. Like have the foot fetish thing be his weird idea of courtship rather than him exerting power over her. Then both Larys and Criston would have a bizarre kind of loyalty to Alicent, which I think would be more interesting.

Now that I think about it, will they be able to release Dunk and Egg before HOTD is finished? Even if they alternate years, it would probably be confusing for a lot of people, since they both concern Targaryens at different points in the timeline. Speaking of confusions, the one big misconception I’ve seen among show-only fans is that a lot of them think Rhaenys is Viserys’ older sister, not his cousin. I think the explanation that Rhaenys was the cousin with the better claim may have gone over many people’s heads, especially since the rules of inheritance is a foreign concept for many of us.

I don’t think search trends have quite the same effect that social media engagement does. The only thing they really have in common is that they’re both online. That said, plenty of people in their 30s and 40s use social media (especially the “media journalists” who are getting grayer every day). I always wondered why the Google trends for GOT were still high, since you presumably don’t need to keep googling it once you have a video link. Then it occurred to me that a lot of people are probably consulting the wiki while they watch to help keep track of all the characters haha.

Some insights into HOTD and ROP’s viewership: https://variety.com/2022/streaming/news/house-of-the-dragon-rings-of-power-streaming-ratings-1235429705/