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How many times have people declared Lady Stoneheart going to arrive? Cry of someone like they were stabbed, not giving birth. Blood on clothes like someone stabbed, not giving birth. Clean baby, obviously not new born ==> Lyana just gave birth! The show runners love to trick folk on the forums into thinking their pet theories right just before they are smashed into little bits. The key to everything is in the crypts. And they sent Rickon to be buried with his father.

Any theory that begins, 'show can't do X because fans would be furious' is idiotic. No, HBO can and will totally crap on fan theories if GRRM tells them different. Most cases the fans complained it was because the show runners knew the larger plot arcs that they don't. It is now obvious that the endgame will be in Winterfell, there is little left in KL. So sending Sansa up North was essential. Makes more sense than R+L. He can't be a bastard. But makes Lyanna and Ned both utterly awful for hiding the kid. It is possible. But it is possible does not mean it must be so. I have a science degree. When testing a scientific theory you look for evidence that disproves it. We know what the scene is set up to imply. But as with the books, misdirection.

You are making a fundamental mistake in your analysis. This isn't science, this is a mystery. You should expect the evidence to be carefully crafted to mislead. so saying that 'it could match our pet theory' isn't at all convincing when the producers know about that theory and are deliberately misleading people as well as GRRM. Does that look like a newborn to you? It looks older to me. Quite a few weeks old. And you can't rely on book timelines to tell you anything. Face it, nothing in the show gave us any information we didn't have from the fever dream. The timeline I think happens in the books is that AA is born to Elia on Dragonstone just before she travels to KL with the other two children. Lyanna is entrusted with the safety of the child which is disguised to look Stark using blood magic so that Lyanna could be the mother. She is to take the child to Dorne. Ned catches up with them at the ToJ. She stabs herself to make the blood magic permanent after hearing of the murder of Elia and the other two children. Like Brienne, she has sworn to protect another's children.

I think that in the books there may well have been more to Joffrey's death. I suspect Tommen actually killed him in revenge for killing his cats. It really doesn't matter, the Plantagenet rule was 'first to Winchester'. Whoever controlled the royal treasury was king. Cersei deliberately killed the entire elite of Kings landing to make sure that there were no alternatives. She was the Dowager Queen and the Regent as Queen Mother. Making the regent queen was pretty much the only logical step. They killed of Pycelle in case he came up with other ideas. Oh so because the blood could be childbirth it cannot possibly have any other explanation. Yes I have seen it, twice and nope it didn't look like anyone was stabbed in the left kidney. Confirmation of Lyanna being the mother would be a newborn baby still covered in blood. There was nothing more in the show than in the books. I do not think that is a coincidence. It is obvious something is being hidden. JonCon - whose name not coincidentally is 'I tell lies about Jon' is only introduced in the books after GRRM says that some folk had figured out who the mother was online. Now why would GRRM have introduced a character called 'I am a con' to give additional clues after they are unnecessary? Jon is only the legitimate heir if he is Rheagar's and Elia's son. This is so obvious that there has to be some misdirection. Rheagar conceals the birth of the third son because he fears Aerys will kill him because of the three dragons prophecy.

Oh so when everyone complained about the unnecessary feeding Miranda to the dogs, that unnecessary gay sex scene with Loras, etc. etc. the critics had it right. Bran is the rightful lord of winterfell. But that doesn't really mean much. Sansa actually has a stronger claim. Nah, they were just liquidating the KL plot and making sure there were no loose ends. Season 7/8 is about the WWs and clearing the board so that its Cersei vs Danny and Jon vs WWs. More than 2 Queens. Queen Danny, Queen Cersei, Plus Yara sansa and the Queen of Thorns and the Dorne woman. No. Cersei was only having her eyes put out. 'Last thing you see before you die'. Nope. All you found out was that Ned wasn't the father. From the sight of her, it looks to me more like Lyanna was stabbed than the blood is due to birth. As in the books there is a baby placed in a room with blood. Rheagar has to be the father. The doubt is in the mother. I am pretty sure that is deliberate. Yep. That is why I think the Lyanna thing is the false lead. Why folk have to insist on her being the mother is beyond me. Yep, in the last book. And the unsullied haven't been told there is an issue yet.

No because only Qyburn and Cersei know she was responsible. To everyone else it looks like the sept was destroyed in a freak accident. Tommen knew because he was prevented from attending. But he is dead. I think Jamie suspects but only because he knows what a depraved bitch his sister is. I think so. I thought that the earlier scenes of them kissing were setting up for Jamie to turn. Jamie certainly served notice that he isn't going to be helping the new Frey get the riverlands back. Not that it matters much with them being dead. Now their children are dead, there is no reason for Jamie to support Cersei.

Quite possibly but probably not till the last season. I think that the show decided to ruthlessly cut out all unnecessary magic. So no Mance/Rattleshirt glamour, no fake Aegon and no lady Stoneheart. Its better to let Arya have that plot line anyway. Notice how the red woman is headed south to where Arya is. Its a baby. It isn't a newborn. And the blood looks like it is coming from her stomach, a stab wound just beneath her rib cage on the left hand side. The whole series is about blood magic and you think the only explanation for blood here is childbirth. You are rushing to conclusions. End season 7 surely. I predicted we would get exactly that scene. Jon is being guarded by the kingsguard so he must be the legitimate king so Rheagar must be the father. For the same reason, Lyanna can't be the mother. The show hasn't ever introduced Jon 'I am a' Con. Jon Con is the only evidence we have that Elia didn't have a third child. And his story is third hand at best. If he is even telling the truth.

Nope and nope. Only one more piece of information than we have in the books and that is that Jon is in the ToJ. And that was obvious. We have known Jon isn't Ned's child from the start. We don't know whose baby he is. It is almost certain Rheagar is the father but we still have no evidence Lyanna is the mother. As with the books, R+L=J is way to obvious to be right.

And it was very clearly found outside the area of the fire. Shireen dropped it when she saw the stake.

Danny has to get the slave masters to surrender because she needs their ships. She can't show Drogon till the morning or they will just run.

The stag wasn't in the center of the pyre, it was at the edge. As if Shireen dropped it before she was tied to the stake.

Karstark probably isn't in deep difficulty but the Umbers are. Violation of guest right. Imprisoning Rickon and giving him to Ramsay as a prisoner was clearly an unforgivable breach of trust.

Yes, I agree. The whining has been awful this season. People just haven't been showing how clever they are by complaining that the show isn't exactly like the books.

Or run behind one of the obstacles that have been planted in the course.

Episode 10. So we won't get an answer, we will get a question. Right now the unsullied haven't really been told Jon might not be a Stark. And yes, that is what we are told in the books. One of the many reasons there is bound to be some fine weeping and gnashing of teeth. Yeah, the Duke of Wellington must have thought that at Waterloo.

Jaq'un's statement was that there would be a new face on the wall no matter what. Thus making the demise of the Waif a racing certainty since he was obviously stating that either Lady Crane or Arya would die so it was fairly obvious that the Waif would get the chop. Being conspicuous was obviously part of a plan to draw the waif out. Being stabbed was not part of the plan.

No, just no. The Waif is dead, Arya killed her. If Arya was dead, her face would be on the wall and bobcut would be gloating. The Waif's face cannot be on the wall if she is alive. The point of putting the Waif's head on a spike was to complete the original contract. The faceless God would not be satisfied until there was a face on the wall. That was the literal contract. Now it is quite possible that Arya takes the face afterwards but putting the head on a spike was about making sure that she wouldn't be looking over her shoulder for a FM assassin the rest of her life.

Well in the Thuggee death cult, an assassin would kill someone, burn the body, bury the remains in the middle of a road and then go back to their temple and commit ritual suicide. That was the legend taught by my history master at any rate and it was complete bollocks. It would be utterly unsustainable as the numbers would inevitably decline.

Why not? Frankengregor has already demonstrated that heads are detachable in Westeros. Perhaps the Waif cut her own head off. Edit: Perhaps GRRM will tell us if there is a safety lock mechanism. Be awfully inconvenient if your head came off at the wrong moment.

Erm, what was it Dany was wanting? Oh yes, ships. Would not be very easy to sail the ships to Westeros after Drogon has torched them, now would it? I really hope that the producers do stuff just to wind up the loonier folk here. They certainly deserve it. if it was me I would have Bran warging back to Shireen's burning so she could say, 'not again! I got burned in the book as well!'. Given that next week will be spent on the Battle of the Bastards, I doubt that we are going to be seeing Danny landing in Westeros this season.

I thought the episode most excellent and the tears of book snobs are most delicious. Its a TV series about ice zombies. Not Tolstoy. Looks like we are safe from LSH and Cleganebowl, both of which would have sucked. Cleganebowl is way too obvious and it wouldn't be a Cleganebowl to Sandor as he knows the mountain is dead. The idea that there weren't enough on screen deaths is ridiculous. The Hound dispatches six people, four with an axe. We see three hang. But folk want to see the Blackfish and the Waif die on screen. WTF, you got a severed head! Oh and then there was the Mountain pulling another head clean off its body with his bare hands. And we saw the Waif kill Lady Crane. I thought of the terminator, yes definitely. And the chase was essentially a car chase on foot. And yes, all roads are converging on Winterfell. In fact it would not surprise me to see Jamie end up going there as well to follow Brienne. The final battle with the WWs has to take place at Winterfell because if they get to Kings Landing, everyone is dead. All that is left in the KL plot is Tommen's death followed by Cersei's. The High Sparrow will die in Baylor Sept in episode 10. It is of course not without irony that Cersei is about to suffer the same fate she attempted to inflict on Tyrion.

Actually, my house has one exactly like it. And probably for the same reason. The basement is below the level of the river and so water can seep in. There is a sump pump to squirt it out. Yes and I get the feeling that it isn't really Cersei he is talking about when he is talking to Edmure. He convinces Edmure to raize the siege so that Brienne can escape. We are getting the start of the redemption arc. As I said all along, no Cleganebowl because its too obvious. And also because everyone knows Cersei has the mountain. Bit of a mistake to let Frankengreggor pull the FM's head off. I thought that. But notice how little she was limping in the house of B&W. It was a ruse to fool the Waif. I am not sure that Jamie is returning to KL. I know it is what he said he would do. But he may not be too keen on just giving the castle to the Freys. Another wildcard in the mix is that Walder may not be too keen on the fact that Ramsay murdered his son who was in the line of succession to WinterFell. Taking a Frey for a wife was one of the payoffs for the Red Wedding.

I thought that as well. Tommen has achieved what Tywin never did. I reckon he is head of house Lannister as the eldest son of Tywin. Tyrion is younger in any case. Interestingly, they are both considered Regicides. I think they probably both killed their father as well.

We are not done with Book 5 yet. Most of the show characters are picking up plots from more than one book character. So Sansa did fake Arya and Jamie did the Dorne rescue. I took Jamie's kiss as a sign that the break with Cersei is about to begin. if it doesn't happen it is probably because book Jamie ends up back with her. Right now though the show runners want to remind us whose fault the whole war of five kings was in the first place. So they are showing Arya seeing her point of view while also showing that she basically deserves everything she gets. Brienne's message is going to be kind of interesting, she is basically going to ask the blackfish to give up Riverrun so they can take back Winterfell from the Boltons. Which is not exactly a great deal except that the Lannister army is laying siege to it.

I have been thinking that she ends up married to Tyrion. Certainly, LF can't marry her until Ramsay is dead. I only hope they will shit on the guy from a higher height. Show or book, Stannis is obviously a shit. The cabin comment did it for me. Arya wanted to be seen. She did it in public as well. Why draw attention to herself? Come to that, if she did use a bag of blood, why run through the crowd clutching her chest, if not to let Jaq'un know that the Waif failed? I am thinking that maybe the Waif knows the hit isn't done yet and will follow her. Arya plus needle can easily beat a Waif who thinks she is mortally wounded. Getting ready to be the first kill for Arya in Westeros, I guess. Unless the hound decides to start on Arya's hit list for her. I think it is the theatre troupe she goes back with. Arya wouldn't be so careless but the Waif would think her so. And whats more, what happened to the other hit Arya was supposed to do? Shouldn't the Waif close the contract?