GZ Bloodraven

You don't think he designed any of the structures he's known for? Or you don't think he physically laid the building blocks?

Because if you are a Targ loyalist, the Starks are the villain, and you need them to be framed as the villain of the whole series. If you want Dany on the throne, Arya, Sansa, Jon and Bran all need to let that happen, and that's 4 to 1. But if Jon is a traitor, Arya is a psychopath, Sansa is complicit, and Bran is the Night's King, then they can be sure that their queen is the one true queen. It's a level of investment in the outcome of a fictional civil war that suggests pretty negative tendencies about the person's cultish IRL behavior which is why I think the entire community gets so up-in-arms about what would otherwise be a couple of misguided readers.

Season 1 GoT also didn't get many noms, but it's weird they didn't get one actor nom (none for Paddy, Emma, Matt or Olivia). I would have expected a Matt Smith nom to match Peter Dinklage's, but apparently they only saw Succession and White Lotus.

I don't know what makes this behavior "scum"? They win. No shame in winning.

This is why I would call it a bad diplomatic moment. Ned was less intelligent than Cersei in this moment, and that's saying a lot. He thought that his word and the truth it carried was more powerful than the queen of the Seven Kingdoms, that he was in a strong enough position to offer mercy. It was a diplomatic moment in the sense that he was offering undue mercy to someone he didn't consider a threat, and it's what got him, his wife and his son killed.

Ned telling Cersei he knew. It's not even a "get me my daughters" trade like Catelyn and Jaime, or a "I'm being radicalized into a cult" like Stannis, it's just a misappropriation of mercy, attempting to extend an olive branch and falling off the fucking tree and damning the realm and his family.

1. Dany, if she marries Aegon 2. Aegon, if he marries Dany 3. Tommen, if he survives to adulthood 4. Gendry 5. Stannis 6. Euron

The maesters were the most powerful cross-national organization during the pre-Targaryen dynasty: politically, it would make sense for them to want a weak magic-focus. If there are a bunch of Thoros of Myr's running around resurrecting people...maggots seem less useful now, I would say. They're also not good at their jobs considering the complete lack of compelling technological advancement in the past 2000 years.

I mean I'd be dead so fast without modern meds and tech (unless I was cultured differently) but the Crownlands (in King's Landing) or the Reach seem the most, I don't know, hospitable? I'd be near freshwater, relatively passive lords in the Reach, plenty of food, good commerce, lots of artists and tourneys, and I'd feel safe under the Tyrells and the Hightowers. Plenty of smaller houses to marry in to, and a week's ride from the maesters for healing. I really prefer cities, and I would not want to live in the cold White Harbor, or in Gulltown with Baelish as my lord, so Oldtown's kind of the spot.

I honestly don't think he's mad, but Farwynd is my favorite ironborn house and I'd love to see them in charge, so I'm kind of biased. The fact that no one has properly committed to exploring across the Sunset Sea is seriously crazy. If them being skinchangers is true, they should be exploring the seas with their hosts, not, like, attacking Oldtown with a kraken or whatever.

All we know is the dwarf's penny (tax on whoreing, blamed on Tyrion). Prices skyrocketed during the War of the Five Kings, so either they had a lot of inflation and kept the tax rate the same, or adjusted it to match prices. Or maybe they demanded more taxes to fund the war and ignored skyrocketing prices (seems like a Joffrey thing to do).

The Cerwyn's should invest an inordinate amount of time into creating Clegane-like warrior-sons. Make Castle Cerwyn the center for all the Northern knights to train, and build yourself up economically by accepting wards and squires. The Hornwood's need to get rid of Ramsay ASAP, invest in timber and marry some houses in the Vale. And legitimize Larence so that the house actually has a future. The Tallhart's should populate the entire Torrhen's River and use it as a robust Western trade root from Oldtown and Lannisport to Winterfell. Also, fresh water supply, build a city, unite effectively against any raiders. This really only works with a charted Sunset Sea and an integrated ironborn, and it's been 2000 years of that not happening, but they could give it a shot.

He has that Bride of Frankenstein condition, nothing more or less. Ned would probably have him dye the hair. If Robert figured it out, though, Ned would have to send Jon into hiding.

Old God-New God marriages are definitely not built from religious origins, but it definitely plays a role in cultural assimilation. When the Andals came, their New Gods won in all the marriage pacts: Ormund III converted, Merle I converted, Nymeria converted. And female Northern marriages to Southern lords lead to the children losing their religion (their culture in another sense). Same is true for Catelyn's kids: though she believes in the seven, Robb's god is the Old God. So there is a religious component to all cross-religious marriages, even if it doesn't look like it.

The incest is basically an open secret. Stannis' entire claim, which has garnered much support, rests on the incest claim. And there's no way the Tyrells don't know that the kids are incest babies. But the Lannisters are the most wealthy house, and that holds sway enough to allow their coup. So, if it were discovered discovered, Tywin could no doubt "Logan Roy" his way out of the problem, maybe not with money, but definitely with influence.

If Shaggydog killed Luwin that early on, the direwolves would all have been killed or sent into the wild. That would have more dire consequences for Bran and the Bloodraven arc than Theon taking Winterfell, though I do agree that, had Bran been given a more decisive advisor, maybe he would have been able to win more loyalty and protect Winterfell.

I think he thought they were better trained, that they were loyal to him beyond his command of them. A narcissism component.

I think I've made my view on this clear in that, like, 5 page thread that wouldn't stop, but there are many things in HotD and the future show universe, and scenes from GoT, that are going to exist in this weird realm off "maybe???" and we should probably address those things. If George PREFERS show Viserys to book Viserys, to dismiss that as entirely non-canonical is sticking to a book puritanism that ignores some truly incredible work set in an ASOIAF universe.

No but the only value of having a Dothraki army is for Viserys to invade Westeros, right? Except he gets himself killed, and now it's Dany who will be invading Westeros. So they set up two separate invasions with two separate armies. Or the Dothraki one was just a weird side project? As for the dragons, it doesn't seem like they expected the eggs to hatch, but then why give them away to her? I agree they don't care much about Viserys or Dany, but they spent a lot of cards on them and it doesn't make a ton of sense why unless they were supposed to be part of the Aegon plan.

Jesus christ. It's a symbol of proximity to the power of the Prince of Pentos. It's a sick display of power.

Aegon and Dany are supposed to be a team right? Except I don't know why they barely monitored Vizzy 3 and Dany, and so heavily monitored Aegon.

I agree, having most of your family get murdered is pretty dark. This is just the "Bran is the Night's King" theory. George might kill Bran off because he's difficult to write, not because he's an evil 9 year old.

Ever? I think Dalton Greyjoy, we know he survived a dozen battles by fourteen. He, Euron and Harwyn Hoare seem to be the most "successful" fighters, but I'm not sure they're the "best" in the Arthur Dayne or Barristan Selmy sense. Though Nightfall may have been kind of like Dawn in the beginning before it was given to House Harlaw, so maybe Harras Harlaw with his 7v1 victory is the best. But it is true that Andrik is considered the fiercest warrior. I think I'd go with Dalton for the best ever, though.

For the people in the South, or for you? The Starks only need to frame Cersei's mismanagement as...well, mismanagement, and get in bed (politically) with either Dany or Aegon, and they should be set reputationally, considering the Boltons are fucked in the head. And obviously Ned was right to attempt to get Joff off the throne, and broadly Robb was right that, after the fall of the Targaryen dynasty, the only source of legitimate cross-regional power, the North was justified in rebellion, and Jon never broke his vows.

But having the Cersei/Jaime plotlines both be POV is introducing new central plotlines. I love both of the plotlines, do not get me wrong, Cersei's chapters in Feast are incredible and you need to keep Jaime around after his great Storm of Swords stuff, but they are a lot of essentially distraction from the scattered Starks, Targaryens, and Tyrion that we started with. And the Martell and Greyjoy plotline being important doesn't change the fact that we have 7 new POVs and a lot of book space for it. And for the need to get to the endgame with a united Martell/Aegon force, I'm glad we agree. Because he would have gotten his book out before the show botched the ending, and before he got bogged down in 1 2 3 4 work in progresses 12 years after the last main series book. The hold now is the shows, Fire and Blood, COVID and grief and life I would assume, and the fact that he has to write the longest book he's every written during all of that. Had he already gotten to the meat of Winds earlier, say, in 2013, we wouldn't be here. And a lot of people are doomer on us ever seeing Dream of Spring. I'm not saying he could have expected the books to take him so long, or that he'd have like 5 shows that he's working on (and Wild Cards, and others), but I am saying it would have been nice to get the last book.