Melifeather

I'm sure many interpret this dream differently, but I see echoes of Marvel comics and two of their characters with magical black armor: the Black Knight and Destroyer. I would really love to read input from our resident Marvel expert Pretty Pig (Some Pig on HoBaW), but she really hates being tagged, so don't do it! Maybe by some miracle she is following this thread and will jump in? Full essay by Some Pig regarding the Black Armor can be found here. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby recycled certain elements across different characters for their personal protection gear. For example they created Uru which is the magical metal of Asgard used for Thor's hammer, Odin's spear, and Captain America's shield. Uru is non-sparking and difficult to mold often requiring extreme methods to forge it. In GRRM's world, something requiring dragon fire perhaps? Uru can absorb magic which is something we've discussed about Dawn or the Stark's Ice. The magical properties of the metal can then enhance the abilities of the person using the object, thus the reason why Arthur Dayne was such a good swordsman. Back to Marvel's Destroyer armor, which is made of an unknown metal - the wearer would then have superior strength, durability, speed, stamina, agility, and reflexes. There is a downside to wearing the armor too long in that the "kill, kill" mentality of the armor can take over the wearer's mind - thus the connection to Jon's berserker dream. The Destroyer armor is not something that can be physically put on, but rather "warged" or projected into leaving the body lying helpless in a catatonic state. When not being "warged" the suit is hidden. In the Destroyer armor's instance, its hidden by Odin, but perhaps Jon's suit of black ice is something hidden by Bloodraven or the Children? This would certainly be a different outcome for Jon rather than being reanimated like Coldhands, Beric, and Catelyn. He could warg his body into this special black ice armor. The only catch is that his body would need to remain alive if he's to follow the same path of the Destroyer, because if the human that is in the Destroyer dies, the spirit leaves the armor and returns to the body, and then Odin hides the armor again.

GRRM's editor (re: Coldhands): "Is this Benjen? I think its Benjen... " GRRM: "NO!"

IMO, no. The show is a different beast than the books. Story lines were condensed, combined, omitted and fabricated. Providing an outline or general path for each character left the show with a lot of room to write their own story. It was basically fan-fiction. GRRM has repeatedly said he's writing his own story and warned about the "butterfly affect" with regards to choices the show made. GRRM has also stated he is a slow writer and calls himself a gardener which implies that while he cares and tends for his "seeds" he cannot guarantee how the plant will grow.

Its interesting to see the history of the depiction. Originally the artist had a five pointed star. Whoever came up with the drawing thought about it long enough to change the star to one with seven sides connecting the falling star with the Faith.

Defining something as pornographic or exploitive requires intent. If a father carries around a picture of his naked toddler, is that child pornography? If a man masturbates looking at underwear models does that make the newspaper flyer pornography? The dance sequences in the movie are intended to make the viewer very uncomfortable. It just wouldn't be as powerful if the depictions were off screen. It would remain this vague idea of something abstract that wouldn't require the viewer to think anything further about it.

There’s no doubt Netflix made a mistake with that pose poster. It’d be like showing a cropped shot of bare breasts on a poster for a breast-feeding documentary. Would you expect to see bared breasts in a breast-feeding documentary? Of course, but if you chose to advertise the film with a poster of only naked breasts then it would look like the film was about objectifying breasts.

Hopefully this isn't going off on a tangent...but...children and women should not bear the responsibility of how their appearance makes someone else "feel". OK, I admit this is a tightwire I'm walking on, because I do find it disturbing to see children acting out a striptease or wearing something that I think is inappropriate, but at the same time is it really their fault if their clothes excites a pedophile? Isn't that putting the burden of blame on the child rather than the pedophile? This is a similar argument for women. Should it even matter what women wear? Isn't how you feel your problem?

I agree with Ran also, and came here specifically to locate people that have not only watched the film, but are intelligent enough to discern presentation from promotion. If you haven't seen the film then you are basing your opinion on a poster. This film does not exploit children, but it will shock and disgust you.

The bleeding seven-pointed stars carved on the Poor Fellows and the invading Andals before them are symbolic of an ancient celestial event that wiped out a lot of people, the survivors of which created a religion that worshipped the fiery destructive meteors. If you carved this representation on your chest shortly before battle, then you were declaring your intent to bring a fiery wrath of destruction on the people you are invading. That may have been true for the conquering Andals, but what about the Poor Fellows? They haven't amassed into an organized army, but they have been escorting people while they travel, offering protection - the complete opposite of what the bleeding stars represented in the past.

Yup. I saw that. I really hope we see Rickon’s return and learn a few of the mysteries he’s been dragging out thus far in Winds, because Dream is seeming more and more like a “pipe dream” as the years go by.

Something struck me today about the Targaryens...Aegon the Conqueror created the Iron Throne from the swords of the defeated. Did he choose the name because the swords were made of iron or is there another reason having to do with the warding of magic? Harren the Black, who built Harrenhal on the shore of the God's Eye, was one of the more famous castles destroyed by Aegon. The God's Eye by all appearances looks like a good location for a meteor impact. Harren also famously cut down thousands of weirwoods for its construction. The God's Eye is of course where the Pact was signed on the Isle of Faces. Edited to add: did the removal of the Targaryens lead to the degradation of the Wall and the leaking of magic back out into the world? Were the Targaryens a ward themselves?

I'm not convinced that Dawn is a renamed Ice. There isn't enough evidence explaining what Ice was, but the blade that Jon Snow dreamt of was a flaming sword while he was encased in black ice.

Maybe "random thoughts" would fall under the Small Questions thread?

I have wondered if planetos itself could be viewed as the sister "moon" to the moon in the Nissa Nissa story, then the celestial event of the red comet striking the moon was viewed as something that happened to or affected both sisters. The comet struck the moon, (or alternately planetos) but the meteors that rained down upon planetos brought magic and forever changing the planet. The scream that Nissa Nissa made was actually the regrettable unintended consequence of the birth of magic. Planetos was now "broken". I go back and forth with this idea and an alternate of there having been two moons after all, because in our real world there are scientists that theorize that our moon was formed when another planet named Thea struck Earth. The red comet could be the remains of "Thea".

Very insightful! The carved bleeding seven pointed stars of the Poor Fellows certainly could be the fulfillment of prophecy which does state “stars”, plural, so it cannot be a single comet. That being said, it’s also possible that the bleeding star carvings are done in memory of an older celestial event when the second moon shattered and pieces of it fell to planetos as burning meteors, which were also said to be dragons pouring forth out of the cracked moon. The falling meteors not only looked like burning swords falling, but also could be described as bleeding stars falling. Different cultures and religions adopted their own interpretation of a single shared event. One saw dragons, one saw flaming swords, another saw bleeding stars, and yet another found actual pieces of the meteor and knew it for what it was and witnessed the birth of magic. The imagery at the Black Gate of the weirwood pulling down the moon seems to indicate that the Children and their greenseers are connected to the event. Was Dawn forged as a weapon to defeat magic or was the actual forging to blame for releasing magic?