TormundsWoman

I’m not sure it’s something that would have changed the outcome of her escape. 1. First of I don’t believe Rhaenys would have ever done it. She proposed Baela to Corlys as heir to Driftmark. She also had the girl close to her in the throne room if I’m not misremembering, when the claims were discussed. I’d think that indicates she wasn’t there to advocate for herself like Rhaenyra supposed and accused Rhaenys of doing. She wanted the Driftmark for her granddaughter. 2. IF she supported Vaemond, nothing would have changed: Viserys’ would have been in a pickle as he gave Rhaenys the last word on this. Basically he’d need to a knowledge that Luke is a bastard, since that’s why Vaemond was claiming the House seat over Luke to begin with, because he was the “last true blooded Velaryon”. Daemon’s sword would still have cut Vaemond for suggesting Rhaenyra’s kids are bastards but I doubt it would have sliced Rhaenys. And the Velaryons would still have been pledged to Rhaenyra with Luke as heir, if Corlys buys the dust. In the end the deciding factor here is Corlys being alive and refusing to die.

Thats true. But regardless of what the actress herself says (which you posted previously, many thanks for that!) and besides the betrothals’ flexibility to be unmade, there’s the scene with Alicent. Rhaenys herself responded to Alicent when asked to pledge herself to Aegon and renounce the Velaryon original pledge to Rhaenyra as heir, that “the word of my house is not fickle”. What I’m saying is, people are not really jumping to conclusions here out of nowhere. It’s in the script. Does the Non-Dracarys mean Rhaenys herself doesn’t agree with the pledge her husband made while Viserys was alive or that she herself wants to stay neutral? I honestly don’t think that’s posible not even in her mind as of that moment. Perhaps she thinks the throne claim could be negotiated since Alicent seems to think so. As Alicent pleaded: “Gently guide” the rulers of their factions to moderate action. I think that’s most likely what was going on, but what is considered fact in universe so far, even for the audiences is that her House is definitely pledged to Rhaenyra. Unless or until Corlys or his successor (should he die) decides otherwise.

Yes, quite a few are thinking that on this forum. It's what I got that from the other thread When I asked last night, I didn't realize it was a hot subject there and thought it was worth discussing, and I usually post on the polls threads first. I clearly was totally behind in topics that sparked debate on the forum!

I’m still reading Rockroi!!! Anyway I just wanted to say that I’m definitely not watching the same show or even reading the same book! Just when exactly did we see her doing that till now? “Always Playing for keeps” meaning hasn’t changed I’m assuming. To my knowledge so far show and book wise Rhaenys had 2 opportunities to “rally the realm” and force a civil war in her own name. Maybe make some vicious move in her own interest before, when she knew there might actually be a chance, before the Great Council and what she actually did was bribe and bought votes and take her toys and go to Driftmark when the decision to crown Viserys over her was pronounced! Basically Until now she has done absolutely nothing to show her “playing for keeps” supposed characteristics! I mean I’m literally reading the references from Fire and Blood and she has shown absolutely no offensive aggressive behavior to the level you ask her to, not even when she WAS fighting for her own claim to the throne. I’m probably missing something but still that’s a very powerful characteristic you’re heaping on her. And you’re asking her to torch “in character” a bunch of her own family as a first act of her playing for keeps?! On Rhaenyra’s behalf no less… who she thinks killed show Laenor? I’m not sure how that makes sense in show context. But it obviously makes to many of posters here the way I’m reading the thread so I suppose that’s a thing.

To my ears your bitching. Nothing wrong with it, that’s why there’s a forum! I’m bitching about other things. I just prefer to do it after I’ve seen the thing

Haha have you finally watched the ep?! How are you bitching about it if you’ve not seen it yet?!?! Someone said it earlier: this ep was made for you!

It’s not only that she would be a kinslayer but she at this point knows that Alicent is trying negotiations. That’s what Alicent told her and the reason why she was holding Rhaenys and Meleys. If the opposition is trying to negotiate and you do not know for sure Rhaenyra herself would want her step brothers and her sister dead and YOU don’t want to burn your niece and nephews yourself, why burn them?! Rhaenys’ objective here wasn’t to stop a usurper, it’s to get herself free from King’s Landing and not be held hostage. Definitely reasonable actions from where she’s sitting. I find it difficult to see why everyone expected her to kill her Targaryen fam en mass to be honest. Thats Otto Hightower not Rhaenys. also hindsight and meta judging is not the point. We all know it would have probably saved some lives but Rhaenys is not us so there’s that.

Do you really think it’s nonsensical? I mean the reason in showing a character that I personally like and consider one of the “better” ones as a person who thrashed that whole population gathered at the pit, is to prove a point: no one, not even someone like Rhaenys will shy from using her dragon power on anyone who’s threatening or in her way once it runs against her purpose. Not exactly sure how else she’d have gotten her dragon out of the pit. These people were at Aegon’s coronation and they were in her way. Also Alicent specifically restricted her and Meleys. Told her to her face too she needed Rhaenyra to know that the scales are balanced dragonwise. So Rhaenys chose a side and made a powerful statement. I think people forget the Blacks are not “good” in the sense we look at good vs bad. They simply have the better claim at the throne, by the in universe rules. anyway, that’s my two cents.

I’ll be honest I thought Erryk Cargyll had a leather pouch with him. I genuinely thought he was carrying Viserys’ crown to Rhaenyra taking that portion of Ser Darklyn’s storyline. But I can see Harry Westerling doing it too. It’s just that he didn’t really say he’s for Rhaenyra. He just said “call me when there’s an anointed king”.

Lol I guess you’re right. I assumed when she said I can’t leave Meleys behind she was prepped to ride her. If that costume is her riding armor I totally was fooled thinking she had it on her. I suppose I should pay more attention!

An 8 for me. The construction was mostly good and some of it I found it outstanding as far as I’m concerned (especially in the Green Council scene). It was clear that regardless of what Alicent made of Viserys’s last speech Otto would have carried the plan he put in motion and he had the Council prepped and ready to go. Alicent is still a pawn and Rhaenys pointed it out masterfully in their conversation. Btw awesome response to Alicent’s proposal! Little doubt what it meant too Meleys is one amazing beast! The scene I found underwhelming was “Looking for Aegon”. So the White Worm just kidnapped the king to stop the child abuse we just saw 30 seconds earlier. And for all her street smart, she took Otto’s word that it will stop and was caught with her pants down by Larys’ thugs with all the network she has watching all the Queens’ machinations. Her spys simply missed Larys’ plotting with Alicent to murder her. I suppose it works. I just found it a bit underwhelming. I refuse to talk about the creepy foot fetish scene because I cannot believe they had this character go through this! Alicent just got over the old man to which her father pimped her to, and under which she had to do her wifely duty willy-nilly. Now this. This is terrible. This woman cannot catch a fucking break. I have more thoughts but I’d need to see the ep again. Oh, and Aemond wanting the throne for himself is so on par with his character. An ambitious young man if ever there was a Targaryen! Healena told everyone about the boards but no one listens to her!!! Was Meleys the beast and it was not a reference to Blood and Cheese(?) who knows.

I loved that! I did think of Blood & Cheese. I also think it's a reference to them. In F&B one of the ideas put forth is that they were actually sent for Aegon but got to Haelena and the kids so when she said that, I think she may have simply glimpsed a sense B&C are coming for Aegon (?). You never know which ideas or versions the writers will pick up from the book. I'm sure it wasn't meant to be. Daemon dared him. And in his mind it was probably planned. It was still the coolest death I've seen yet. Also, Vaemond was cutting off Baela and endangered Rhaenyra's kids with his claim, so I am fine. He totally knew he's dying. He yelled at the heir of the throne that she's a whore and her children are bastards and have no claim to the throne. It's hardly unexpected. And while the king would have only cut his tongue, I doubt he'd complain about the resolution even if he was healthy... I thought the scenes with Ewan Mitchell were really good myself, and they played to more than insulting his nephews and drawing lines where the greens and balcks stood at youth category so to speak. I found them to be an excellent set up of Aemond vs Daemon. Aemond studied Daemon in the throne room. He saw his uncle slice Vaemonds' head cool as cucumber and without a twitch. He is pissing around to see if and how he can provoke him. He also tries to stare him down after the Strong scene. There's def vibes there. I totally ship them as archenemies. LOL thank you! I thought no one would say it.

I was 100% sure all the sniffing Daemon did when him and Rhaenyra were in Viserys's room was going to end with an accusation of poisoning! They know what milk of the poppy is, how it smells like, what is it for and they saw in how much pain the king was, why would you sniff so at that glass?!

My own thoughts CT! Well written review. I also think there's little that this misunderstanding actually changed. It was clear from the dinner table finale that even if Alicent might have reconsidered, and looked for a reconciliation and renunciation to the throne, Aegon, Aemond and Otto would not have done so and would not have stopped. That's the problem when you raise your kids in a toxic environment and with hatred toward something. Eventually you can no longer control that. It has become something that's difficult or impossible to reverse. As for myself, I gave it an 8. It was a very good ep actually. It had a compelling drama, outstanding acting by Paddy Considine and Wil Johnson with excellent material for their characters of which they took full advantage of, and the direction and cinematography was some of the best of the series especially at the family dinner scene. The most weird thing happens though when you get this excellent storytelling and then you sense them trying to connect the dots with GoT and ASoIaF prophecy. To my eyes and ears it sticks out, feels out of place and out of context with the story. I understand that behind the scenes it's something Martin approved. I do. There is though the problem that once you make something in entertainment and arts, once you put it out there for people to enjoy, analyze, judge, unless you conveyed what you wanted in the work properly and seamlessly, you can hardly modify it afterwords without sticking out as sore thumb. And unfortunately for me, as a reader of ASoIaF, this sounds completely like retcon. Granted, Eustace, Mushroom, Munkun or any other Westerosi had no idea about this specific prophecy passing through Viserys and to Rhaenyra because they were never in the room where it happened so it would never appear in any fake history I read. But to me, it sounds and feels like trying too hard. And unfortunately art IS in part about perception, feeling and what you understand from the work you are watching, reading etc. Also wonderful gruesome death for Vaemond. Died like a badass yelling the truth because he chose his hill to die on and stuck to it. True, he was an asshole to discount Baela but this is a story where a badass truth sayer can also be an asshole at the same time. He also was not telling quite the pure truth. This was not ONLY about managing his own house, as he yells at Viserys or he wouldn't have practically pledged his power to the Hightowers to back Aegon's claim to the throne. This unfortunately was about much more. I have the feeling Rhaenys would have advocated for her granddaughter though, a true born Valeryon not for herself as heir to Driftmark if it came to that. But she couldn't say that to Rhaenyra as that would put Baela in the hot spot.

I stand corrected! Thank you, never realized there was a specific thing added for literary prizes and I must admit the last time I actively looked was 2016 because of Bob Dylan. That said, that was the moment I read Virginia Woolf was snubbed over Pearl Buck at some point. You probably know who the she is, but I had to google Ms. Buck in order to find out who she was and what she wrote. I am sure she influenced literature, after all The Good Earth received a Pulitzer. But I am less sure her contribution is greater than Woolf's though, fact that contributed to my returning to literary prizes that are awarded for single works. I think these tend to be easier to judge side by side.

I haven’t sent the preview but I know the next ep is titled Lord of the Tides so we should definitely see a more Velaryion centric episode. Vaemond’s eulogy, Rhaenys pushing Baela as heir over Luke, it looks like they are cooking that conflict and at some point they have to serve it! I’m all for seeing it

Haha yes the actual knife did come out en ep later! in regards to your last paragraph: I do believe it’s a possible scenario. Ser Harry was supposed to die around the same time as Grand Maester Runciter a while back when Daemon gets in trouble for seducing his niece, but showwise we only got Mellos and we still have the Lord Commander of the KG Ser Westerling. And we only have just a mention one him dying with no context, so they could have him die at the green council with a slit throat and have Criston Cole do it and replace him as LC of the KG. It’s actually a very good read of the “compressing characters and rearranging timelines” situation they got going on in HotD. Cool idea!

Now, now Ormond! Why you do this to me?! Why didn't you quote me so I can see the disagreement properly?! To understand why I said that, you have to know that I learned the first time about the Nobel Prize when I read my first Sienkiewicz novel. I was a kid, probably in 4th grade looking for something in lines of Paul Feval, or Dumas pere but found this Polish turn of the century dude who wrote about history from my corner of the world (see, I was not born in US). So after reading his whole trilogy With Fire and Sword, The Deluge and Pan Wolodyjowki, someone told me I was reading a Nobel Prize winner so I asked what's that prize for. The teacher said it's for outstanding body of work by a writer who contributed with his literary stuff to improvement of mankind. Or something very similar because it stuck with me. Clearly, not an obscure literary figure or body of work. I was too young then to search what in fact is the guideline for awarding these prizes, plus there was no internet back then, but when I grew older I did look it up. And while guidelines are always changing, I can tell you that even today if I am not mistaken, for literary prizes that's pretty much their stated guideline. I do understand that it is just a guideline, but that's how I still viewed it until I lost interest in who is winning it. Interesting someone mentioned Muller. I read one book of hers and while I don't remember anything else about it, I do remember the poplars that were lining the big boulevards back home. It was a book about the Ceausescu regime before it's fall and life during those years but I only know that because that is the reason I bought it. Otherwise, completely forgettable writing, because in my opinion there are other Romanian writers who did it much, much better. That's if you refer to Herta Muller. Again, literature is subjective. So clearly different strokes for different folks.

You know most of the people where I participated and posted, including here, were doubting you can do 2-3 of seasons out of 300 pages and I thought that kind of thinking will have consequences in how they adapt F&B material because in a series you need to build these characters in order to have an impact if something happens to them. So naturally I believed they’ll flesh out these characters with some side stories or get them involved in the larger story and dilate the linear storyline of F&B, but they actually are sticking pretty close to the format of fake history. The issue I think is that where bookwise I can read and imagine how Leana is from two theee paragraphs (badass, fearless and kind, a good mom and wife), show wise you have to build and show these things. And they didn’t do it entirely or at least not enough for a portion of the audience to care. Hence while I give them a lot of latitude because I must have read everything about Dance at least a couple of times in whatever variation there was (novella, fake histories), I completely understand your issue of not caring because you don’t know much about these characters.

Lol I think lots of peeps do that “ahhh” but accompanied by some eye roll very interesting parallel with Aemond being a second son and doing a Corlys/ Daemon, because that’s a theme here.

It’s so random. This award is no longer given to writers who consistently come to the public eye for quality works for entire decades. So when Bob Dylan won the Nobel literature prize back in 2016 for his entire body of lyrics, well… I stopped caring about this one and I never regretted it. Nothing against Bob Dylan. But I’m sure there’s a LOT of other prizes he was worthy of winning while not taking away from writers like Rushdie for example or Ngozi Adichie or Murakami. Anyway curious to see who they come up with this time. Just wanted to add that I do hope they don’t give it to some politician. One Winston Churchill was enough.

I think on the whole the same as you. It also was good to see Vaemond trying to advance these ideas because it will set up the fallout of who is heir for the Velaryons (from the book). These things that Vaemond says about bloodlines and Rhaenyra’s kids not being Valeryons by blood make Vaemond’s entire claim to Driftmark in F&B. Of course it never crosses his mind that Leana’s daughters are next in line even if Rhaenyra’s kids are discounted. Which brings back the theme of women being passed over for men: I wonder how Rhaenys would feel if Corlys would make his peace with this and gifted all possessions to Vaemond by naming him his heir. Bet that she’d suddenly fight tooth and nail just like her husband is for a piece of what he sees as her inheritance that was taken away from her.

I think she felt beyond frustration at seeing herself powerless and with no one to back her. She even confused Otto’s line “put down the knife, Alicent” with a condemnation of her actions. She looked surprised when in private he praised her. He’s truly a leech and a snake. His daughter had the balls at least to act on what she thought, he is just scheming and waiting to strike like a snake. “Control your passions”. Ugh Can the actor be more of a genius in line delivery though!!! Love him. Also, apart from the whole scene, I would have slapped Viserys when slighted (and basically trolled) her in front of the whole elite court: “ I’m going to bed, Aemma…” To put salt on those cuts he made, when Harry Westerling asked if he should accompany Queen Alicent to her rooms, Viserys said to Westerling: no…

The thing about Alicent is that I do not see it pure evil. I rather see her as a tragic character that was used and abused and now does the same to her own kids. She did absolutely everything that was asked of her, she satisfied her father's wishes, satisfied Viserys' desires, she stayed in her mold, she was promised the IT for her first male child because that was the precedent set and she sees another who gets everything by doing none of the prescribed female molding things... fuck that! Totally human to feel that kind of rage though most of us humans contain it and we put breaks and realize life ain't fair and we do not plot to kill, maim and hurt others but strive to change and maybe do better. But she seems to be too far gone. And when she does show remorse and voices it, what does that asshole Otto do?!?!? eggs her on. Is proud of her. Fuck him too. Anyway, I read all your comments. In the polls threads as well as here. I think the way you view the show and conflict is much different than how I view it and I cannot really address it. The reality is that I don't see the "good" and "bad" sides as you do. I simply don't see general greater good about any of the characters or their claims. I understand you think the show portrays them like that but to me it simply looks like that is a portion of the audience's interpretation. A smaller one at that. The way I read the fandom (here, reddit, WOTW etc) as well as the reviews, a much much larger part see it as a dark world with very grim and generally bad characters. The majority of complaints are that there is no one to root for. That means there are no real "good guys". That being said, I do root for Cregan to come and just be himself and put an end to all the double cross, plotting etc. But that's just me. And @Mark Antonyapparently! Lol.

I understand. Killing and unnamed character is not as impactful as killing a genuinely decent and honorable guy, as Laenor was portrayed until then. However, it would be remiss of me to ignore the fact that Daemon DID sacrifice an innocent life, for a goal that suited him, the person he loves (Rhaenyra) and someone else (Laenor for whom he seems to have a respect). In fact it adds to killing Rhea for his own purpose and he doesn't look redeemable to me. The fact he had reservations and points out that in order for him and his niece to be married Laenor needs to die is a good grey area that I approve. Also providing help for Rhaenyra who shrewdly realizes that Laenor would never be capable of fighting for her and her kids as Damon would. So yes, he has some reason behind killing a nameless character and seems to be motivated by some good feeling towards others than himself but you called him a "saint", and I don't see it. Are you a saint in your view if you start killing people you don't know anything about because they serve a purpose you need to attain and provide happiness to some couple, gay or otherwise?