Groo

The only thing worse than an immoral plan is a stupid immoral plan. Jon's whole plan ultimately depends on Melisandre taking him at his word that he switched the babies. That might have worked if he told her shortly after Gilly was safely away, but he seems to be sitting on it, presumably intending to say it if Melisandre actually tries to do anything. That would be the worst time to say it. She might think he's desperately lying to save the child. She might even think her cause is so important that she's willing to risk sacrificing a non-kingly child just in case Jon is lying. I don't think Jon significantly reduced the risk of a child being sacrificed. He certainly didn't eliminate the risk. He just changed which baby was at risk.

Just pick one of Tyrion's many quips. I'll go with "I'm not insulting your honor. I'm denying its existence."

Petyr Baelish challenging Brandon Stark to a duel for Catelyn's hand. Even if he won, Hoster wouldn't have agreed to it. Catelyn didn't agree to it and clearly rejected him. There was no possibility of a win here.

Setting aside all this Red Wedding discussion, Black Walder is close to the top. I don't need to make general statements about the Freys in order to think that he is more than willing to off family members to become Lord Frey. Maybe he can pull it off with "limited casualties to the family", but I don't need to be staunch Stark fan to think a fight is coming.

Of course, every battle commander or general is automatically evil. His orders led to large numbers of deaths and casualties in every battle. Clearly, they are all monsters. Serial killers, on the other hand, are tame and not really that bad. Most only kill a handful of people which is nothing compared to the atrocities of leaders. Wait, let me guess. You're going to switch gears and claim the issue is that "Robb's war" was unjust and unnecessary. You'll just move the goal posts to talking about intent and purpose, ignoring that people like Raff and Tickler miserably fail any moral test that isn't simply body counts.

That adds a lot of dramatic possibilities. Assuming Robb named Jon as his heir, she might end up opposing Jon because he's Targaryen and not a Stark. Or maybe she pushes for him to take the Iron Throne because that helps him while also removing him from Winterfell. Or maybe she'll support Jon if he marries his cousin Arya so Queen Arya can bring serious vengeance to all the Stark enemies. Or maybe you're right and she just melts on the spot. So many possibilities. If she does find out (for example, she meets Howland and he tells her) it would be pretty dramatic is she showed up unexpectedly and publicly handed Robb's crown to Jon and then demanded he bring retribution to all their enemies.

Too light. She should be forced to marry Elmar and become a Frey. I know some will say forcing a young girl to become a Frey is cruel and unjust but "foul murder" requires truly severe punishment.

Martin likes to build up to dramatic payoffs. Daenerys didn't fly for the first time by just practicing in the courtyard. Jon was facing possible execution as a traitor when he suddenly becomes Lord Commander. The Lannisters look like they have everything under control when Joffrey suddenly gets poisoned at his own wedding. If R+L=J is true, then Martin has been waiting for 5,000 pages to reveal this. It won't just be Bran passively having a vision in a cave. There will be something big and immediate that happens when the reveal comes.

Sure, that's why he tried to get elected Lord Commander, because he has no ambitions.

Am I missing something? He was mocked and insulted about his looks. Oh, and his dad had a kind of gross way of making money. That's your candidate for worst backstory in the books?

The Martell choice: Tywin, Gregor, and Amory The Lannister choice: Stannis, Renly, and Robb The Stark choice: Joffrey, Tywin, and Cersei

Well, George Foreman named most of his boys George so there is precedent for it.

That's a very interesting take. The gods were not upset that the Rat Cook took his revenge. They punished him for violating guest rights. The Freys are always described as weaselly looking (i.e. rodent looking) too!

You've more or less answered your own question here. How often do the children of superstar athletes grow up to be superstar athletes as well? If your bar is set at that level then you aren't going to see much in the way of family "dynasties".

Yes, but to sue for damages you need to show that you received an inferior product. For example, a restaurant can substitute ingredients from what's listed on the menu provided the substitute ingredients aren't cheaper or of worse quality. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume the ending in the books will not be deemed to be inferior to the ending in the show.

I feel like a fool for having missed that.

I'm always mystified by people who want to twist the story into anything but what they're actually reading. The main series is roughly 5,000 pages long. It has 158 Stark POV chapters, 76 Lannister POV chapters, 31 Daenerys POV chapters, and 21 Greyjoy POV chapters. That's who the story is about. Yet some people will grab a few random sentences and build some elaborate theory about why the story is really about some other incredibly minor characters. The only thing I find harder to understand is the seeming masochists who intensely dislike most of the characters. If you hate the Starks then why are you reading all of this? It's like reading all the Harry Potter books just so you can write a 3,000 word essay about how much you despise Harry, Ron, and Hermione.

I think Doran is much more in control and connected to what happens in Dorne than people give him credit for. As readers, we keep getting hit over the head by the Sand Snakes' and Arianne's unfavorable impressions of Doran and his rule. But look at what goes on without filtering it through their perspectives. Doran has the Yronwood's neck deep in the Quentyn plot but there's surprisingly little rumor or gossip floating around about it. Doran wants Balon Swann delayed and his bannermen quickly make that happen. Arianne's plot falls apart and Doran has no problem having the sons and daughters of bannermen quickly punished. For long stretches of the story Doran has had large numbers of troops gathered and assembled along the border with no pushback that we're aware of from his bannermen. That kind of effective control of your domain isn't possible unless you're closely tuned in to and informed about what goes on in your lands. I don't think some orphan needed to directly speak to Doran for word to get to him.

I think it was the Orphans of the Greenblood. Garin worked with the orphans to arrange for the boat to be waiting for them on the Greenblood. The boat where Aero was waiting. These would be the same orphans who were observant enough to have spotted Quentyn when he was quietly trying to arrange passage to Essos. The same orphans who had no qualms about breaking into Quentyn's room to try and read his papers. The same orphans who then blabbed about all of this and passed the information along to Arianne. It never occurs to Arianne that the orphans might have put two and two together about why she needed a boat for some super secret mission nor that they might have blabbed about that as well.

You need to register at the local Sept but the lines are usually long and slow.

A lot of this discussion reminds me of Twyin's response when Tyrion questions him about all of this. "Explain to me why it is more noble to kill ten thousand men in battle than a dozen at dinner." At first that sounds philosophical, maybe even profound, but it's just more BS from Tywin. It wasn't just a dozen nobles at dinner. How many hundreds or thousands of ordinary soldiers were massacred? We learn from Sallahdor Saan that it's the smallfolk who have named it the "Red Wedding". The Sparrows and other leaders of the Faith are preaching to angry mobs about the Red Wedding and the violation of guest rights. They aren't doing it because they're Stark supporters or even supporters of the North. The Brotherhood Without Banners attracts followers because it is supposedly fighting for the smallfolk. The BWB is killing a lot of Freys and I don't think they're doing it just because Lady Stoneheart is ordering it. She's a symbol and constant reminder of the horrors of the massacre. But, sure, let's just talk about this like it's nothing more than a feud between two noble families that needs to be adjudicated.

Are we talking about where the character started or their position at the time of the marriage? I'm thinking about Petyr Baelish. At the time of his marriage, he was officially Lord Paramount of the Trident, Lord of Harrenhall, and on the small council. From that position marrying Lysa Tully isn't a big reach. If you consider where he started from, however, then he's hands down the winner, at least for the characters in the main story.

300 miles of wall defended by about 700 men, few of whom are actually rangers, and somehow Mance overengineers a plan that involves most of his forces frontally attacking the gates, the only places the Watch can really defend. Dude, ignore the gates for now. Just keep swarming the wall in dozens of places and attacking the castles from the south. Keep pressing the attack like this and the Watch will collapse. And don't give me any nonsense about casualties. You're facing total annihilation by the Others and every moment you're north of the Wall your people are at risk.