The Tyrell Conspiracy

[Ygrain]

7 hours ago, Agent 326 said:

With the kicking around part of it I was talking about right before Joffrey "drank" the poison, because of this one couldn't be sure if Joffrey would even drink it or pour its contents onto the floor. I never implied that the poison was in the chalice.

And what I said is that the poison coudln't have been in the chalice before the cutting of the wedding pie, and that it would make no sense to attempt poisoning it prior. The cutting of the pie was a pre-planned event and Joffrey wouldn't be taking his wine with him. At the same time, the cutting would be a distraction, nobody would be watching the chalice. So here you go an opportune moment which you know would be coming, and all you need is to make sure that Margaery won't drink. Which is not a problem if she is in the know.

Come to think of it... no-one could have expected that the chalice would wind up close to Tyrion, and thus close to Garlan and Leonette. Unless several Tyrells were let on, so that Olenna could pass the poison to the one with best opportunity, it again points to Butterbumps as the one freely moving about the hall and no-one really paying attention to him. The piece I am missing here is the knowledge on whose behest Taena Merryweather lied - Olenna's, LF's, or was it a little scheme on her own? If Olenna, then it might point to the Tyrell ladies, but GRRM said that they wanted to go with "he choked on the pie" version. LF setting the circumstances to make Tyrion look suspect is, IMHO, very likely because he needed Sansa widowed for his plans with the Vale, but Taena has her own reasons to get in Cersei's good graces, as well.

7 hours ago, Agent 326 said:

Also last I checked Tyrion and Sansa would want to be as far away as possible from Joffrey.

Check again. They would want to, but they don't get to make the seating order.

7 hours ago, Agent 326 said:

Also you where questioning about Olenna doing something in front of everyone that the server couldn't do sorry if I wasn't clear but I was talking about removing the stones.

Well, me too. There is nothing suspicious about an old granny adjusting a young girl's hair, but the server, uh-oh.

7 hours ago, Agent 326 said:

Also why use the hairnet to begin with and not have Olenna and some point take some poison and slip it into the wine, it makes a lot more sense like that.

Because the hairnet implicates Sansa, should the plan go south, and because it provides an opportunity to do the poisoning without establishing any connection between the poisoner and the substance. If you can't prove that Olenna ever had access to strangler, then you have a problem. Remeber Tyrion's trial? He was in Pycelle's chambers and stole some of his stuff, so in everyone's eyes, that's how he got hold of strangler.

6 hours ago, sweetsunray said:

Agreed that they don't need to. Different victims, and each compound of poison will not be a copy of the previous, nor is the wine in which it's mixed or the volume of the wine. It's actually very realistic imo, especially given the source and how they're made. One plant or leaf may have more toxins than the other, or more sizable than the other, and it's plants the poison is made of. The stuff they add to the leaves can vary. 1 gr seems like nothing to us, but on molecular and particle levels it may mean a great deal. The whole manufacturing technique is not as precise as can be done with modern chemical equipment either. This is typical for manufacturing medicine from plant material: it's imprecise to begin with. 

And even with the modern laboratory techniques, the onset of effects is never the same because of the other factors I mentioned earlier. We're talking here about a difference of tens of seconds, and the time between drinking and eating is even less.

 

[Ygrain]

Funny, the latest episode of Radio Westeros about Joffrey covers the Purple Wedding, as well, referencing interviews with GRRM where he says that Joffrey was indeed the intended victim and the poison was in the wine. The discussion of the Purple Wedding starts at about 2 hours into the listening.

[sweetsunray]

4 hours ago, Ygrain said:

Funny, the latest episode of Radio Westeros about Joffrey covers the Purple Wedding, as well, referencing interviews with GRRM where he says that Joffrey was indeed the intended victim and the poison was in the wine. The discussion of the Purple Wedding starts at about 2 hours into the listening.

Thanks for that.

When the chalice-pie discussion comes up, I just can't help think of the "pellet of the poison that is in the vessel with the pestle, while the chalice of the palace has the brew that is true..." euhm "no, the pellet of the poison is in the flagon with the dragon, and the vessel with the pestle has the brew that is true, because they broke the chalice of the palace."

Note - it can't be in the flagon with the dragon, if it was in the vessel with the pestle. It was the chalice of the palace (with the brew that is true) that broke. Unless they poured the poisoned content of the vessel with the pestle in the flagon with the dragon, and then refilled the vessel with the pestle. And I think George crafted his Olenna after the actrice in the scene, and put every possible symbol on the chalice, so there would be no confusion for Margaery as she tried to remember which cup she wasn't to drink of anymore, after the pie.

[John Suburbs]

22 hours ago, Chebyshov said:

The one point worth clarifying for others here (I've long since learned everything else is an exercise in futility with you): Joff had to be killed specifically at the wedding after the ceremony and not before Marg's valuable hymen was punctured because that is what would have given her some legitimacy as a queen and the Tyrells more political power, while still putting themselves in a position where if shit goes toe-up with the Lannisters, they can get out. Sort of like how she was Renly's queen but never tied to that cause.

Their reasons for acting are quite well-established, and once again, this pet theory does nothing for the story in terms of meaning or character arcs. 

What legitimacy does Margaery have as Joffrey's unbedded, widowed queen? What political power does she or the Tyrells wield with her as queen-in-waiting for bonny prince Tommen? This is the exact situation she was in during Feast and she had absolute no power. At Joffrey's death, Cersei remained as queen regent and kept her seat on the small council. Cersei acted in the king's name and spoke for him in all matters of state. And upon Tywin's death, which the OP says was part of the plot, but I disagree, Cersei chaired the small council and made appointments to it. Cersei decided where and how money was spent and armies, including the Tyrell army, were deployed -- to Storm's End, not to Highgarden when the ironmen attacked.

If Joffrey had lived, Cersei would have been packed off to her next husband in a fortnight and Margaery would have immediately had all the status and authority as the new Queen of Westeros. But he died so for the next five years she is reduced to playing little mind games with Tommen in order to drive a wedge between him and his mother.

If you are going to present one theory to back up another, you might want to at least check first to see if it conforms to the facts on the page. And the facts are clear as crystal: Joffrey's death stripped Margaery of any and all power she would have had as queen and gave it all right back to Cersei -- something that was easily predictable by anyone with half a brain.

[John Suburbs]

22 hours ago, Agent 326 said:

I agree, anything can be possible here. This is like the Pink Letter or Bran's Catspaw, personally I think it was Mance for both, wait I figured it out, it was Mance...

Sorry, I think you misunderstood my sarcasm. Anything is not possible here. Poisoning the wine is not possible. It is impossible to predict where the chalice will be at the only moment there is even the slightest chance of poisoning it unseen -- the moment the pigeons took flight. It is not possible for a tiny sip of normal looking wine to cause a man to drop six times faster than a young boy who is drinking multiple mouthfuls of wine so thoroughly poisoned it has turned "deep purple."

It is also not possible for a woman like Lady Olenna to commit regicide at a big public event in such a high-risk manner while placing virtually her entire family in jeopardy, all to prevent a situation that might occur some time in the distant future that leaves her granddaughter with a black eye. Plenty of queens, both real and imagined, have suffered far worse for their crowns.

It is also not possible for the man who uses chaos to climb the rungs of power to remove the most chaotic, politically powerful and completely naïve piece of the board of the Game of Thrones.

It is not possible for an anointed knight like Garlan, a scion of the house that literally invented the code of knightly chivalry, to resort to a weapon of women, cowards and eunuchs to kill an enemy. And it is not possible for anyone else to have poisoned the wine.

These are just the things that are not possible with the wine theory. If I were to list all the things that are improbably or just extremely unlikely, you would be reading all night.

[John Suburbs]

22 hours ago, sweetsunray said:

Horseshit.

They don't know molecular processes. They don't have "mol" unity. They can't measure a particle. They don't even know there are such things as atoms and molecules. And thus they cannot write a chemical cristallizing reaction. And there is no way they can regulate the toxin levels in the leaves themselves. That's impossible.

Even modern labs that make medicine from plant material can't make a similar dosage in each compound. That's one of the reasons that labs study the plant material and then prefer to replicate it artificially, because that's the sole way you can control the level of how active it will be to the T, and make the dosage a copy in each compound. 

All the makers can do in aSoIaF is make experimental notations and use measurements where they are sure that each compound will always be active enough to kill, but it will vary from a few sentences still being said to a mere second reaction. Someone who wants to get someone else poisoned doesn't really care whether it's 30 secs or 10 secs difference - dead is dead. The guarantee you have with a crystal is that it will suffocate the victim for sure within a minute, once dissolved. It's dissolved in wine to mask the color and it cannot be ingested and won't have effect unless dissolved. The color alone makes it impossible to use the cream or the pie - neither is purple. And in order to have a sollution worked into the pie, the poison would have needed to be used in the process of making the dough, and then more people would be reaching for their throats.

How do you know what they can and cannot do? Show me the text that gives a first-hand account of the alchemy labs of Lys. They might not have modern science, but they can certainly perfect a recipe over the eons to produce a product that is consistent and reliable.

When you are trying to poison a king but not your granddaughter, five seconds vs 30 seconds could make all the difference. In five seconds, you have a reasonable chance that Margy could avoid drinking long enough for Joffrey to start choking, although she still has to explain why she broke with custom to let him go first. At 30 seconds, impossible. Now you're forced into your earlier contention that someone has to create some kind of commotion to give Margy some cover, all of which casts the eye of suspicion directly at the Tyrells the moment the king hits the floor. And since the risk to Margaery only increases the longer Joffrey goes without succumbing, why on earth would they deliberately give him a big, honking chalice that can only serve to dilute the poison?

Also, we have clear text that shows Joffrey's wine was so thoroughly poisoned (after he barfed his pie into the chalice) that it was deep purple. If your theory is correct, that is the color it must have been when he was tipping the chalice up end to take his multiple chugs. So if you are going to argue that Cressen's wine was six times more potent than "deep purple", then his wine should have appeared almost black. And even if you still hold to the unlikeliest of notions that he would either fail to notice this as he is staring at the last half-swallow in his goblet, or just fail to acknowledge this fact in his POV, that still leaves us with the contention that a tiny flake of strangler is enough to turn an ordinary amount of wine black. And if that is the case, then the strangler would be considered next to useless as a poison for high value targets like kings and nobles, and the preferred delivery method would most certainly not be as a crystal dropped in wine. So the entire theory falls apart simply by its own assertions, not through any speculation about what the alchemists can and cannot do in their labs.

And pigeon pie is not purple, but it's not chicken pot pie either. Here are some pictures

http://www.reallynicerecipes.com/recipe/game/pigeon-pie

http://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/foodanddrink/darinaallen/darina-allens-ballymaloe-pigeon-pie-314993.html

Plenty of dark filling to hide a purple stain, particularly from somebody who is just taking an obligatory bite for a king he despises.

[John Suburbs]

19 hours ago, Ygrain said:

And what I said is that the poison coudln't have been in the chalice before the cutting of the wedding pie, and that it would make no sense to attempt poisoning it prior. The cutting of the pie was a pre-planned event and Joffrey wouldn't be taking his wine with him. At the same time, the cutting would be a distraction, nobody would be watching the chalice. So here you go an opportune moment which you know would be coming, and all you need is to make sure that Margaery won't drink. Which is not a problem if she is in the know.

Come to think of it... no-one could have expected that the chalice would wind up close to Tyrion, and thus close to Garlan and Leonette. Unless several Tyrells were let on, so that Olenna could pass the poison to the one with best opportunity, it again points to Butterbumps as the one freely moving about the hall and no-one really paying attention to him. The piece I am missing here is the knowledge on whose behest Taena Merryweather lied - Olenna's, LF's, or was it a little scheme on her own? If Olenna, then it might point to the Tyrell ladies, but GRRM said that they wanted to go with "he choked on the pie" version. LF setting the circumstances to make Tyrion look suspect is, IMHO, very likely because he needed Sansa widowed for his plans with the Vale, but Taena has her own reasons to get in Cersei's good graces, as well.

Check again. They would want to, but they don't get to make the seating order.

Well, me too. There is nothing suspicious about an old granny adjusting a young girl's hair, but the server, uh-oh.

Because the hairnet implicates Sansa, should the plan go south, and because it provides an opportunity to do the poisoning without establishing any connection between the poisoner and the substance. If you can't prove that Olenna ever had access to strangler, then you have a problem. Remeber Tyrion's trial? He was in Pycelle's chambers and stole some of his stuff, so in everyone's eyes, that's how he got hold of strangler.

And even with the modern laboratory techniques, the onset of effects is never the same because of the other factors I mentioned earlier. We're talking here about a difference of tens of seconds, and the time between drinking and eating is even less.

 

The poison could not have entered the chalice before the cutting because Joffrey took a long drink and then went through the whole  ten-minute ceremony with no affect.

So this was the plan? Littlefinger spends a small fortune acquiring the poison and crafting the hairnet with the trick clasp. Then he and Lady O meticulously plan setting up the back-channel with Ser Dontos, getting her the poison, creating the chalice, arranging the dwarf joust, letting every Tyrell in the room in on the plot, determining exactly how and when to retrieve the poison from Sansa, and then the final moment to actually deploy the poison comes and all they can come up with is, well, somehow the chalice will be within someone's reach at the only moment it can be poisoned? And if it had simply sat right at Joffrey's place next to Tywin and Cersei the whole time? If Joffrey had chosen to bring it with him to the cutting?

Butterbumps is seen hours earlier cavorting with Moonboy around the tables. To think that a fat, sweaty oaf like him could simply shadow Joffrey and the chalice all around the head table, and at a formal ceremony during the feast no less, is simply absurd. It would be more reasonable to assume he tossed the crystal into the chalice from halfway across the room. He is a juggler after all.

Taena lied because she was already planning to get close to Cersei.

Littlefinger could not have possibly predicted that the dwarf joust would lead to an extended conflict between Tyrion and Joffrey, nor that Tyrion would be made cup-bearer, nor that Tyrion would be handling the chalice just before Joffrey drank. He is not magic.

If Sansa gets accused of the murder because of her hairnet, then the next one to fall will be Lady Olenna. Long before the hot poker reaches her pretty little eye, Sansa will give up the story about how she got the hairnet and who touched it that day. And that story could be corroborated not only by Tyrion, but possibly Kevan and Lancel, who were in the immediate area as well. There is no way Lady O could hope to implicate Sansa with the hairnet without putting herself, and subsequently, because everyone else is involved too, her entire family in jeopardy.

[sweetsunray]

2 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

How do you know what they can and cannot do? Show me the text that gives a first-hand account of the alchemy labs of Lys. They might not have modern science, but they can certainly perfect a recipe over the eons to produce a product that is consistent and reliable.

Because it's a damn fact of the nature of labs and its source material (plants)! We don't need text for that, aside from the general world building setting and knowing what it's made from. We know the apothecary methods from Arya's chapter in the HoBaW (even it's not the Strangler, that is made in one particular location) - a pinch, a spoon, etc... And then there is the issue of plant material, which I already explained. Why do you think wine of this year and that year varies in quality?

They can make it reliable because of the aeons of experience of what is the necessary minimum. Reliability is not necessarily an issue. But it sure as hell will vary.  

[Lord Wraith]

On 6/4/2017 at 3:15 AM, Agent 326 said:

Now one must ask why Agent 326 are you not including the Purple Wedding? Was the Purple Wedding Olenna's doing? First conspiring with Littlefinger who was praising Joffrey at Bitterbridge and was Joffrey's Master of Coin is a dumb move, he has every reason to turn you in. Why put Loras on the Kingsguard if you're afraid of him killing Joffrey? Margery was drinking from the chalice, meaning she could die to. Wouldn't one put the poison in Joffrey's pie? Also wait was the poison in Joffrey's wine? No it wasn't as the effects between Joffrey and Cressen's consumption of the Strangler don't match. Cressen fell over immediately and died. While Joffrey's throat was working just fine after drinking the wine and he managed to eat two pieces of not just anyone's pie, but Tyrion's pie (not this isn't the first time either that Littlefinger tried to kill Tyrion, first with blaming the assassian to kill Bran, then the Battle of Blackwater Bay, then the Purple Wedding and most recently with Penny, I'm not going to go into much detail as that is for Littlefinger and this is about the Tyrells.) Stay focused me. And also spewed a line and drank some more wine.

Why Baelish? Likely because he was in cahoots with Renly and Loras from the beginning of the story.

On 6/4/2017 at 8:46 PM, Agent 326 said:

Littlefinger killed Jon Arryn to bring Ned into the fold in King's Landing. All this is to set up the coup at the end of AGOT. After all what else could he be doing it for. If it was to kill Ned, then why save him when Jaime attacked. If it was to start a war, why blame the catspaw on Tyrion the one man of importance in the king's party not in King's Landing, after he had urged Cat and Ned to throw the Dagger into the sea. Goal get Cat out so he can get Ned to catch onto the incest rumors of which he spread (seriously how on Planetos would Stannis, Loras, Maester Coleman, Maester Pycelle, Varys and Renly all get the same rumor unless it was spread by a man who loves to spread rumors and easily has the means to). Also Littlefinger needed to kill Lysa to allow him to bring war into the Vale, (aiding the Rosby, Crakehall and Waynewood Freys though that is a subject for another day), and he knew that the Lords Declarent would likely win. So he starts buying up their debt and plans on returning to King's Landing. The only problem is that Tywin dies and Cersei essianntly give the finger to all previously established regimes. Also Tyrion likely would've gotten as far away from Cersei as possible. Also Littlefinger has a plan (not just war and chaos) and it involves several things and the following are the steps that he takes.

Step 1: Get Lysa to be in love with you.

Step 2: Have her get you several positions to impress Jon Arryn.

Step 3: Get Master of Coin position and begin beggaring the realm.

Step 4: Start making the Gold Cloaks your cronies as well as men like Lothur Brune, The Kettleblacks, Dontos, Mandon Moore, Janos Slynt.

Step 5: Spread the incest rumors.

Step 6: Have Lysa kill Jon Arryn to get Ned to become Hand.

Step 7: Get the coup to happen so you get Harrenhal.

Step 8: Set up the riot in King's Landing that happened when returning to the Red Keep from Myrcella's trip to Dorne.

Step 9: Marry Lysa.

Step 10: Kill Lysa.

Step 11: Give the Vale Lords financial support or titles to win them over (Anya Waynewood, Nestor Royce, etc;)

This is all the while trying to kill Tyrion, get rid of anyone else who can pay for the crowns debts, (such as the Stokeworths, Rosbys, Tyrells) collecting wards (Tyrek Lannister, Sansa Stark, Harry Hardyng, Robert Arryn). The Purple Wedding was just an attempt to kill Tyrion.

Also it is worth remembering that the Tyrells want Margery to be queen, killing her husband before they can consumate the marriage is stupid.

Can people please just admit when they parrot Prestin Jacobs instead of acting like its their own ideas?

[sweetsunray]

2 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

Also, we have clear text that shows Joffrey's wine was so thoroughly poisoned (after he barfed his pie into the chalice) that it was deep purple.

It was running down purple down his chin as he drunk, before he ate and barfed the pie.

2 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

So if you are going to argue that Cressen's wine was six times more potent than "deep purple", then his wine should have appeared almost black.

A - Does it? It might actually be more heavily toxic in a brigther or more reddish purple once dissolved.

B - Cressen and Tyrion are two different POVs who may describe the impression of a color slightly different. Not everyone sees colors as nuanced, and certainly with age the clairity and subtlety of color variation decreases. My parents in their 70s have debates over what color is something all the time. It's probably their most hotly debated topic of every day.

2 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

And pigeon pie is not purple, but it's not chicken pot pie either. Here are some pictures ... snip

Totally ignores the fact it must be dissolved, and thus is more than just a bit of bone colored purple. Oh wait... you purport the barfed up pie colors the wine deep purple, but the chicken pie only has a solid piece somehwat purplish when it's not effective in solid form.

2 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

why on earth would they deliberately give him a big, honking chalice that can only serve to dilute the poison?

vessel with the pestle, broken chalice of the palace, flagon with a dragon

But hey... you're arguing the author himself.

[John Suburbs]

22 hours ago, sweetsunray said:

Because it's a damn fact of the nature of labs and its source material (plants)! We don't need text for that, aside from the general world building setting and knowing what it's made from. We know the apothecary methods from Arya's chapter in the HoBaW (even it's not the Strangler, that is made in one particular location) - a pinch, a spoon, etc... And then there is the issue of plant material, which I already explained. Why do you think wine of this year and that year varies in quality?

They can make it reliable because of the aeons of experience of what is the necessary minimum. Reliability is not necessarily an issue. But it sure as hell will vary.  

OK, I'm going to respond to this again because the post I submitted earlier is gone. So if the original shows up later, my apologies

Sorry, but you're reaching here. The process has been perfected over hundreds of years. They might not know the exact science of it, but they know the amounts, temperatures, durations and all the right steps. To argue that one batch is going to be six times stronger than another is just making things up to fit a conclusion.

We have from the text that Joffrey's wine was deep purple while Cressen's did not appear unusual at all. If anything, Joffrey's was the more potent. That trumps any speculation you want to give about how exact their poison production capabilities are.

In addition, it is absurd to think that Lady O would intentionally give Joff a huge chalice that would only delay the onset of the poison and place Margaery at greater risk of either drinking or suspiciously declining.

And finally, since we can see for a fact that the strangler works on contact, like ammonia or hydro-c, not as a systemic poison like arsenic or snake venom, that greater or less dilution or stronger of weaker batches will not delay the onset of symptoms -- it will only lessen their severity. It you were to drink a straight shot of ammonia, it would burn you instantly. If you poured the shot in a big class of water it would still burn instantly, but not as badly. Same principal here -- and that's the damned fact.

[John Suburbs]

22 hours ago, sweetsunray said:

It was running down purple down his chin as he drunk, before he ate and barfed the pie.

A - Does it? It might actually be more heavily toxic in a brigther or more reddish purple once dissolved.

B - Cressen and Tyrion are two different POVs who may describe the impression of a color slightly different. Not everyone sees colors as nuanced, and certainly with age the clairity and subtlety of color variation decreases. My parents in their 70s have debates over what color is something all the time. It's probably their most hotly debated topic of every day.

Totally ignores the fact it must be dissolved, and thus is more than just a bit of bone colored purple. Oh wait... you purport the barfed up pie colors the wine deep purple, but the chicken pie only has a solid piece somehwat purplish when it's not effective in solid form.

vessel with the pestle, broken chalice of the palace, flagon with a dragon

But hey... you're arguing the author himself.

Same as above -- not sure what happened to my earlier post.

It was a thin layer of red wine, translucent on his pale, white skin and illuminated by orange candle and torchlight. Of course it's going to look purple. If the wine was actually purple at this point, how did it turn back to red when spilled on the dais, then back to purple in the bottom of the chalice?

Another reach. A purple poison in red wine and the wine turns purple. The same poison in another quantity of wine and no discoloration. Common sense dictates that the purple wine is more concentrated. If you had any text at all to back up your brighter, more reddish idea I might go along with you, but there is none. It's just another example of inventing facts out of whole cloth just to cling to a thoroughly debunked theory.

Cressen is looking into a small goblet in a brightly lit room and sees normal wine. Tyrion is looking into a large chalice in an equally lit room and sees deep purple. There is nothing wrong with Cressen's eyes; he can see the purple crystals just fine.

The crystal is dissolving in the pie, thus: "... a bit dry, though. Needs washing down." Then he washes it down with wine, speeding up the dissolution process as it hits his throat. Then yes, he barfs up the pie into the chalice, probably with the bulk of the now-softened but still intact crystal. I'm not sure where you're going with the chicken pie. I was only using it as an example to draw a distinction from pigeon pie, which most people don't seem to realize is very dark in color.

I am not arguing with the author. All the SSMs on the subject are related to the show, and his answers shift from the show, the book and historical precedence. So it's impossible to say whether any given statement from Martin is referring to the book or something else.

[Lord Varys]

The Strangler was most definitely in the wine. Anything else makes no sense.

Now, Olenna herself is indeed a very unlikely candidate to physically put the poison into the chalice because she is too small for that. The Strangler was most likely put in there during the cutting of the pie since Joffrey emptied the chalice earlier on Tyrion. That makes Garlan Tyrell the most likeliest suspect. Olenna was there when people were trying to convince Joffrey to continue with the feast.

Butterbumps is never mentioned to be close to the chalice. Left and Right would be tall enough to put the Strangler into the chalice without much difficulty but they are not mentioned to be with Olenna when she comes over. That's why Garlan is the most likely suspect. Nobody would have been watching him while they were cutting the pie.

And it is very clear that quite a few - and perhaps all the Tyrells with the exception of Mace and Loras - were in on the plot. Lady Alerie takes the lead, pushing forward the story that Joff choked on his pie when she 'soothes' Margaery. The best way to ensure that they are not caught is to prevent anyone from finding out or concluding that Joffrey was poisoned. Mace later apparently insist that Tyrion is convicted and executed because he nearly killed Margaery. He could be clueless about what actually happened or he could be part of the game.

The Tyrells all have to act in concert if they want to ensure that Margaery is now going to marry Tommen. Tywin and the other Lannisters don't want that at all.

[Ygrain]

7 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

I am not arguing with the author. All the SSMs on the subject are related to the show, and his answers shift from the show, the book and historical precedence. So it's impossible to say whether any given statement from Martin is referring to the book or something else.

Bullshit. Here goes the interview: (bolded red emphasy mine)

In some ways, Joffrey’s death is the toughest death for viewers because he’s such an entertaining character to lose. You really had such fun with that character and Jack Gleeson’s performance is so malevolent. Can you talk about the decision you made to end this character when you did and how you did?

Martin: Oh boy, it was so long ago! Lets see, the book came out in 2000, so I guess I wrote those scenes in like 1998. I knew all along when and how Joffrey was going to die, and on what occasion. I’d been building up to it for three years through the first books. Part of it was that there’s a lot of darkness in the books. I’ve been pretty outspoken in my desire to write a story where decisions have consequences and no one is safe. But I didn’t want it to be unrelentingly bleak—I don’t think everyone would read the books if everything was just darkness and despair and people being horribly tortured and mutilated and dying. Every once in a while you have to give the good guys a victory — where the guys who are perhaps a lighter shade of grey have a victory over the guys who are a darker shade of grey. The Red Wedding and this — fans call this the Purple Wedding — occur in the same book. In the TV show, it’s separate seasons. But Joffrey’s death was in some ways a counterweight for readers to the death of Robb and Catelyn. It shows that yes, nobody is safe—sometimes the good guys win, sometimes the bad guys win. Nobody is safe and that we are playing for keeps. I also tried to provide a certain moment of pathos with the death. I mean, Joffrey, as monstrous as he is — and certainly he’s just as monstrous in the books as he is in the TV show, and Jack has brought some incredible acting chops to the role that somehow makes him even more loathsome than he is on the page — but Joffrey in the books is still a 13-year-old kid. And there’s kind of a moment there where he knows that he’s dying and he can’t get a breath and he’s kind of looking at Tyrion and at his mother and at the other people in the hall with just terror and appeal in his eyes—you know, “Help me mommy, I’m dying.” And in that moment, I think even Tyrion sees a 13-year-old boy dying before him. So I didn’t want it to be entirely, “Hey-ho, the witch is dead.” I wanted the impact of the death to still strike home on to perhaps more complex feelings on the part of the audience, not necessarily just cheering.

At the same time, in the moments leading up to that, you seem to really enjoy giving him this grand sendoff by having all these moments during his wedding where he demonstrates the character traits that make us so dislike him. The wedding is self-aggrandizing — he throws his money around, he chops up Tyrion’s present, he orders that offensive dwarf joust. He gets to display all of the reasons why we want him to die just before he dies.

Martin: Yeah. I think Joffrey is a classic 13-year-old bully. Do you know many 13-year-old kids you’d like to give absolute power to? There’s a cruelty in children, especially children of a certain age, that you see in junior high and middle school. We don’t want 13-year-old bullies to be put to death. We probably do when we’re their 13-year-old victims, but they grow up and most of them grow out of it, and sometimes people do regret their actions. But Joffrey will never get that chance, so we don’t know what he would have become. Probably nothing good, but still…

 

You also deny us the expected way that we would think that Joffrey will die, which would be by one of the hands of the surviving Stark kids, or through some other obvious mechanism from people he has wronged. You give us his death, but deny use the typical pleasure that we would normally get from it.

Martin: I wanted to make it little bit unclear what exactly has happened here, make the readers work a little to try and figure out what has happened. And of course, for Tyrion, Joffrey’s death doesn’t make things better, it makes things worse. Tyrion’s in terrible trouble, and it proves that something I’ve tried to make a point of through the whole series: Decisions have consequences. When Robb breaks his word to House Frey and doesn’t marry one of Frey’s daughters, that has dire consequences for him. One of Tyrion’s problems has been that he has a big mouth. He’s been saying things since the beginning of the series, these veiled threats to Cersei—”someday I’m going to get you for this, someday your joy is going to turn to ashes in your mouth.” Now, all these declarations make him look really guilty.

 

In other words: Joffrey's death ahd been telegraphed all along, and it is brought upon him by his own actions, not some coincidence when someone else was supposed to be poisoned. Also this:

Martin: Who kills Joffrey? 

Rolling Stone: That killing apparently happens early in this fourth season. The Song of Ice and Fire books, of course, are well past the poisoning of King Joffrey. 

Martin: In the books — and I make no promises, because I have two more books to write, and I may have more surprises to reveal — the conclusion that the careful reader draws is that Joffrey was killed by the Queen of Thorns, using poison from Sansa’s hair net, so that if anyone actually did think it was poison, then Sansa would be blamed for it. Sansa had certainly good reason for it.

The reason I bring this up is because I think that’s an interesting question of redemption. That’s more like killing Hitler. Does the Queen of Thorns need redemption? Did the Queen of Thorns kill Hitler, or did she murder a 13-year-old boy? Or both? She certainly had good reasons to remove Joffrey. Everything she’d heard about him, he was wildly unstable, and he was about to marry her beloved granddaughter. The Queen of Thorns had studied Joffrey well enough that she knew that at some point he would get bored with Margaery, and Margaery would be maltreated, the same way that Sansa had been. Whereas if she removed him then her granddaughter might still get the crown but without all of the danger. So is that a case where the end justifies the means? I don’t know. That’s what I want the reader or viewer to wrestle with, and to debate. 

Joffrey's murder is poised as a moral debate for the reader. It is not written as a mere "yay" point, as in the previous quote, a terrible death of a thirteen-year-old boy. If Joffrey was a mere casualty, then there is no debate. Also, note that statement that Olenna had good reasons.

All the issues you have with the colour of wine or the extra seconds it takes for Joff to start choking, please, take it to GRRM.

 

On a side point: I think the part about Tyrion's big mouth and consequences of one's actions is important - while the Tyrells knew neither him nor Cersei that well, LF would have been able to predict both Tyrion's (and Joff's) reaction to the jousting dwarves as well as Cersei's reaction to her son's death, thus setting Tyrion up as the fall guy and getting rid of him, thus getting rid of 1) Sansa's husband, 2) the single guy who had enough with to disclose his financial machinations, 3) the guy who knew that LF had lied about the dagger, 4) the guy who played LF to find out who Cersei's informant was. And that all while LF's hands are perfectly clean, as he emphasizes to Sansa.

On that "may have more surprises to reveal": IMHO, that concerns the way the poison got into the wine, and has something to do with Olenna being notably short, not much taller than Tyrion, who cannot even reach the chalice without climbing onto his seat.

 

 

 

[sweetsunray]

11 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

Sorry, but you're reaching here. The process has been perfected over hundreds of years. They might not know the exact science of it, but they know the amounts, temperatures, durations and all the right steps. To argue that one batch is going to be six times stronger than another is just making things up to fit a conclusion.

Straw man:I never argued that one crystal would be 6x stronger than another. And you're exaggerating to make someting fundamentally correct about plant sources material and the physical limitations of labs ridiculous. Who's reaching here then?

It doesn't matter how long they have established the recipe. The fact is that they do not have the instruments and measurement tools for such precise copying. Even in CERN there will be variations on any test made. The advantage of chemistry is that if you throw the right stuff together, even in the wrong combo-amounts, you will always have an effect, because the reaction chain will sort itself out on molecular level. So, an effect is guaranteed, but the details may vary.

11 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

We have from the text that Joffrey's wine was deep purple while Cressen's did not appear unusual at all. If anything, Joffrey's was the more potent. That trumps any speculation you want to give about how exact their poison production capabilities are.

I reiterate that Cressen is old, and both that and invididual differences may have the same color appear differently to two people. But most importantly GRRM actually takes meticulous care on how a POV focuses and notes things differently than another POV. Cat mostly watches hair growth and hair color. Jaime takes particular care of watching people's eyes and inferring personality from them. Sansa watches clothes. Tyrion notes food, but tends to guess people's ages younger than they actually are (especially adolescent men). So, no, I'm not reaching here. 

The color of the wine with Cressen is never mentioned, ommitted.  That doesn't mean that it didn't change color. Just that Cressen's POV never focused on the wine color. The only color he ever focuses on is the red hair, silk, lips, eyes, and ruby of Mel. Hmmm, curious, no red wine either. And there's a very logical reason why Cressen would never think "the wine was purple"... he knows what he put in there, and knows its effect, and he doesn't need to think "it's purple now".

12 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

In addition, it is absurd to think that Lady O would intentionally give Joff a huge chalice that would only delay the onset of the poison and place Margaery at greater risk of either drinking or suspiciously declining.

Who's the one reaching here? Big cup! Nobody can miss it, or mistake it for another. And it's Joffrey's.

There's nothing suspicious about Marg declining a drink from it at some point, when she needs to, because she's not supposed to get as stupidly drunk as Joffrey.

I'll use your favourite term: "You're reaching"

12 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

And finally, since we can see for a fact that the strangler works on contact, like ammonia or hydro-c, not as a systemic poison like arsenic or snake venom

We actually know it doesn't work on contact. People handled the crystals, touched them, and they don't have stiff, swollen, purple claws because of it, or stiff, swollen tongues. People can touch the purple wine fine too. If only the throat swells and stiffens and blocks the airway tight, then it is systemic. It fits most with anaphylaxic shock, which is a systemic reaction.

And that's the "damned fact".  

[sweetsunray]

12 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

Cressen is looking into a small goblet in a brightly lit room and sees normal wine.

Fetch me the quote where Cressen sees normal red wine once he poisoned it. You're reaching.

 

12 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

I am not arguing with the author. All the SSMs on the subject are related to the show, and his answers shift from the show, the book and historical precedence. So it's impossible to say whether any given statement from Martin is referring to the book or something else.

Ygrain already responded to that. You ARE arguing with the author's own confirmation and words about the book Purple Wedding. You're reaching. Your arguments are absurd. And they don't have anything to do with facts.

[Agent 326]

On 6/6/2017 at 11:04 PM, Lord Wraith said:

Can people please just admit when they parrot Prestin Jacobs instead of acting like its their own ideas?

I must admit that yes to some degree I am however when I was watching his The Deeper Dorne videos and he threw out the idea of the Tyrell Master Plan, which got me thinking. Is their actually one. And well this is nowhere near as fun as the Dornish Master Plan and this is more of their goals. However I don't think they are going to be Targaryen loyalists. Yes the Littlefinger Debt Sceme makes a lot of sense and so why not use it. also I don't think the Tyrells helped in the Purple Wedding because it undermines all that they have built.

[Darkstream]

On 2017-6-5 at 2:58 PM, Agent 326 said:

She's an unreliable narrator because she is a lunatic, keep watching the rest of the series and you will see one piece of info thrown at you after another that screams insane bitch. 

 

On 2017-6-5 at 3:07 PM, Agent 326 said:

She isn't misinforming us, she's an insane bitch. Like I said keep watching the rest of the videos in the series. 

Yup, hateful, and unfounded derogatory comments about a character is certainly a good way to try convincing others of your stance. You keep telling others to watch some bogus videos; Well, I'll tell you, go read the books!! Because whatever is in some internet video that is leading you to the conclusion you have come to, is not supported by the actual text. Why would anyone go watch a video on your recommendation, when it has led you to this assessment of Cat?

Having read the books, and reading your comments that have been influenced by this video, I can say that you have convinced me of the exact opposites of what was your intent. I certainly will not be watching these videos, as what you've taken away from them is enough to show me that they are most likely a heaping pile of horse shit.

[bent branch]

On Invalid Date at 5:36 AM, aryagonnakill#2 said:

I can't tell if your being serious or not.  How would Sansa even know what was in the hair net?  Are you saying she is also blocking out Dontos telling her about it?  And if so why the hell did LF explain to her a false plan?

I am serious.

Well, here is Dontos telling Sansa about the hair net (ACOK Chapter 65):

Quote

 

It was a hair net of fine-spun silver, the strands so thin and delicate the net seemed to weigh no more than a breath of air when Sansa took it in her fingers. Small gems were set wherever two strands crossed, so dark they drank the moonlight. "What stones are these?"

"Black amethysts from Asshai. The rarest kind, a deep true purple by daylight."

"It's very lovely," Sansa said, thinking, It is a ship I need, not a net for my hair.

"Lovelier than you know, sweet child. It's magic, you see. It's justice you hold. It's vengeance for your father." Dontos leaned close and kissed her again. "It's home."

 

This is the other place Dontos tells Sansa about the hair net (ASOS Chapter 16):

Quote

 

When she told Ser Dontos that she was going to Highgarden to marry Willas Tyrell, she thought he would be relieved and pleased for her. Instead he had grabbed her arm and said, “You cannot!” in a voice as thick with horror as with wine. “I tell you, these Tyrells are only Lannisters with flowers. I beg of you, forget this folly, give your Florian a kiss, and promise you'll go ahead as we have planned. The night of Joffrey's wedding, that's not so long, wear the silver hair net and do as I told you, and afterward we make our escape.” He tried to plant a kiss on her cheek.

Sansa slipped from his grasp and stepped away from him. “I won't. I can't. Something would go wrong. When I wanted to escape you wouldn't take me, and now I don't need to.”

 

Later in ASOS-Chapter 61, Sansa remembers this:

Quote

Ser Dontos had said the hair net was magic, that it would take her home. He told her she must wear it tonight at Joffrey's wedding feast. The wire stretched tight across her knuckles. Her thumb rubbed back and forth against the hole where the stone had been. She tried to stop, but her fingers were not her own. Her thumb was drawn to the hole as the tongue to a missing tooth. What kind of magic? The king was dead, the cruel king who had been her gallant prince a thousand years ago. If Dontos had lied about the hair net, had he lied about the rest as well? What if he never comes? What if there is no ship, no boat on the river, no escape? What would happen to her then?

So, Sansa obviously remembers the meetings with Dontos that we saw. The only thing I'm suggesting that Sansa misremembers is her taking the amethyst out of the hair net and putting it in the chalice. I think I can show good evidence that Sansa was the poisoner and the Tyrells had nothing to do with it if the focus remains narrowed on just that question.

Before leaving these quotes behind, I would like to point out that there was obviously at least one meeting in between these two meetings, but we don't know what happened except for the bolded. Sansa was told to wear the hair net to Joffrey's wedding and do something. What that something is we don't know. When I brought this topic up over three years ago, some people said that “...and do as I told you,” meant preparing for the escape. However, the sentence isn't constructed in that manner and suggests that Sansa had been told to also do something with the hair net at Joffrey's wedding. Sansa was afraid of doing it. Again, some people claimed that what Sansa said she was frightened of was the escape, but Sansa had been begging to escape without having to go to Joffrey's wedding. So, Sansa was frightened of what she was asked to do at the wedding.

Now, let's see what our eyewitness saw at the Purple Wedding (ASOS – Chapter 60), the section being quoted is the only time the poison could have been put in the chalice:

Quote

 

The guests stood, shouting and applauding and smashing their wine cups together as the great pie made its slow way down the length of the hall, wheeled along by a half-dozen beaming cooks. Two yards across it was, crusty and golden brown, and they could hear squeaks and thumpings coming from inside it.

Tyrion pulled himself back into his chair. All he needed now was for a dove to shit on him and his day would be complete. The wine had soaked through his doublet and small clothes, and he could feel the wetness against his skin. He ought to change, but no one was permitted to leave the feast until the time came for the bedding ceremony. That was a good twenty or thirty dishes off, he judged.

King Joffrey and his queen met the pie below the dais. As Joff drew his sword, Margaery laid a hand on his arm to restrain him. “Widow's wail was not meant for slicing pies.”

“True.” Joffrey lifted his voice. “Ser Ilyn, your sword!”

From the shadows at the back of the hall, Ser Ilyn Payne appeared. The specter at the feast, thought Tyrion as he watched the King's Justice stride forward, gaunt and grim. He had been too young to know Ser Ilyn before he'd lost his tongue. He would have been a different man in those days, but now the silence is as much a part of him as those hollow eyes, that rusty chainmail shirt, and the greatsword on his back.

Ser Ilyn bowed before the king and queen, reached back over his shoulder, and drew forth six feet of ornate silver bright with runes. He knelt to offer the huge blade to Joffrey, hilt first; points of red fire winked from ruby eyes on the pommel, a chunk of dragonglass carved in the shap of a grinning skull.

Sansa stirred in her seat. “What sword is that?”

Tyrion's eyes still stung from the wine. He blinked and looked again. Ser Ilyn's greatsword was as long and wide as Ice, but it was too silvery-bright; Valyrian steel had a darkness to it, a smokiness in its soul. Sansa clutched his arm. “What has Ser Ilyn done with my father's sword?”

I should have sent Ice back to Robb Stark, Tyrion thought. He glanced at his father, but Lord Tywin was watching the king.

Joffrey and Margaery joined hands to lift the greatsword and swung it together in a silvery arc. When the piecrust broke, the doves burst forth in a swirl of white feathers, scattering in every direction, flapping for the windows and the rafters. A roar of delight went up from the benches, and the fiddlers and pipers in the gallery began to play a sprightly tune. Joff took his bride in his arms, and whirled her around merrily.

 

And there is everything Tyrion saw and thought during the time the wine was being poisoned. The chalice was between Tyrion and Sansa on the table. Tyrion didn't notice anyone approach from the front of the table until the serving man came. Tyrion didn't notice either Leonette or Garlan bend over him to put something in the chalice. And Tyrion didn't notice anyone step between him and Sansa from behind to put anything in the chalice. Indeed, Sansa was actually holding on to Tyrion at one point so no one could have stepped between them. Who was the only person Tyrion noticed moving around near the chalice? Answer: Sansa. So when Tyrion has these thoughts in ASOS – Chapter 66, they are not just the petty spitefulness Sansa's supporters would suggest. He literally does not notice anyone else around the chalice in real time.

Quote

 

Assuming Joffrey had not simply choked to death on a bit of food, which even Tyrion found hard to swallow, Sansa must have poisoned him. Joff practically put his cup down in her lap, and he'd given her ample reason. Any doubts Tyrion might have had vanished when his wife did. One flesh, one heart, one soul. His mouth twisted. She wasted no time proving how much those vows meant to her, did she? Well, what did you expect, dwarf?

And yet … where would Sansa have gotten poison? He could not believe the girl had acted alone in this. Do I really want to find her? Would the judges believe that Tyrion's child bride had poisoned a king without her husband's knowledge? I wouldn't. Cersei would insist that they had done the deed together.

 

But we do have another eye-witness who more or less agrees with Tyrion's observations that no one else approached the chalice during this time. Who is that witness? Answer: Sansa. In all of her fretting over the amethyst from her hair net poisoning Joffrey's wine, she never once mentions someone behaving suspiciously near the chalice. This is extremely telling.

But, but, but, Littlefinger knew someone touched Sansa's hair net! Of course he did! The poison amethysts were in the hair net. No matter how the poisoning was accomplished someone had to touch Sansa's hair net. Knowing that someone had to touch Sansa's hair net before they could poison Joffrey only shows that LF knew the poison was in the hair net, which we already knew.

If you go back and read the conversation between Sansa and LF only trying to imagine it from LF's POV and him knowing that Sansa was the one who poisoned the chalice, you will see that conversation is not what Sansa is imagining it to be. LF realizes that Sansa can simply rewrite things in her head in a manner that let's her live with herself. It also means she can be manipulated and this makes her valuable to LF. (This conversation is in Chapter 68 – ASOS, it is too long to quote). Sansa is being groomed by LF, but he is not looking out for her best interests. She is in extreme danger, but she doesn't realize it.

[John Suburbs]

16 hours ago, Ygrain said:

Bullshit. Here goes the interview: (bolded red emphasy mine)

In some ways, Joffrey’s death is the toughest death for viewers because he’s such an entertaining character to lose. You really had such fun with that character and Jack Gleeson’s performance is so malevolent. Can you talk about the decision you made to end this character when you did and how you did?

Martin: Oh boy, it was so long ago! Lets see, the book came out in 2000, so I guess I wrote those scenes in like 1998. I knew all along when and how Joffrey was going to die, and on what occasion. I’d been building up to it for three years through the first books. Part of it was that there’s a lot of darkness in the books. I’ve been pretty outspoken in my desire to write a story where decisions have consequences and no one is safe. But I didn’t want it to be unrelentingly bleak—I don’t think everyone would read the books if everything was just darkness and despair and people being horribly tortured and mutilated and dying. Every once in a while you have to give the good guys a victory — where the guys who are perhaps a lighter shade of grey have a victory over the guys who are a darker shade of grey. The Red Wedding and this — fans call this the Purple Wedding — occur in the same book. In the TV show, it’s separate seasons. But Joffrey’s death was in some ways a counterweight for readers to the death of Robb and Catelyn. It shows that yes, nobody is safe—sometimes the good guys win, sometimes the bad guys win. Nobody is safe and that we are playing for keeps. I also tried to provide a certain moment of pathos with the death. I mean, Joffrey, as monstrous as he is — and certainly he’s just as monstrous in the books as he is in the TV show, and Jack has brought some incredible acting chops to the role that somehow makes him even more loathsome than he is on the page — but Joffrey in the books is still a 13-year-old kid. And there’s kind of a moment there where he knows that he’s dying and he can’t get a breath and he’s kind of looking at Tyrion and at his mother and at the other people in the hall with just terror and appeal in his eyes—you know, “Help me mommy, I’m dying.” And in that moment, I think even Tyrion sees a 13-year-old boy dying before him. So I didn’t want it to be entirely, “Hey-ho, the witch is dead.” I wanted the impact of the death to still strike home on to perhaps more complex feelings on the part of the audience, not necessarily just cheering.

At the same time, in the moments leading up to that, you seem to really enjoy giving him this grand sendoff by having all these moments during his wedding where he demonstrates the character traits that make us so dislike him. The wedding is self-aggrandizing — he throws his money around, he chops up Tyrion’s present, he orders that offensive dwarf joust. He gets to display all of the reasons why we want him to die just before he dies.

Martin: Yeah. I think Joffrey is a classic 13-year-old bully. Do you know many 13-year-old kids you’d like to give absolute power to? There’s a cruelty in children, especially children of a certain age, that you see in junior high and middle school. We don’t want 13-year-old bullies to be put to death. We probably do when we’re their 13-year-old victims, but they grow up and most of them grow out of it, and sometimes people do regret their actions. But Joffrey will never get that chance, so we don’t know what he would have become. Probably nothing good, but still…

 

You also deny us the expected way that we would think that Joffrey will die, which would be by one of the hands of the surviving Stark kids, or through some other obvious mechanism from people he has wronged. You give us his death, but deny use the typical pleasure that we would normally get from it.

Martin: I wanted to make it little bit unclear what exactly has happened here, make the readers work a little to try and figure out what has happened. And of course, for Tyrion, Joffrey’s death doesn’t make things better, it makes things worse. Tyrion’s in terrible trouble, and it proves that something I’ve tried to make a point of through the whole series: Decisions have consequences. When Robb breaks his word to House Frey and doesn’t marry one of Frey’s daughters, that has dire consequences for him. One of Tyrion’s problems has been that he has a big mouth. He’s been saying things since the beginning of the series, these veiled threats to Cersei—”someday I’m going to get you for this, someday your joy is going to turn to ashes in your mouth.” Now, all these declarations make him look really guilty.

 

In other words: Joffrey's death ahd been telegraphed all along, and it is brought upon him by his own actions, not some coincidence when someone else was supposed to be poisoned. Also this:

Martin: Who kills Joffrey? 

Rolling Stone: That killing apparently happens early in this fourth season. The Song of Ice and Fire books, of course, are well past the poisoning of King Joffrey. 

Martin: In the books — and I make no promises, because I have two more books to write, and I may have more surprises to reveal — the conclusion that the careful reader draws is that Joffrey was killed by the Queen of Thorns, using poison from Sansa’s hair net, so that if anyone actually did think it was poison, then Sansa would be blamed for it. Sansa had certainly good reason for it.

The reason I bring this up is because I think that’s an interesting question of redemption. That’s more like killing Hitler. Does the Queen of Thorns need redemption? Did the Queen of Thorns kill Hitler, or did she murder a 13-year-old boy? Or both? She certainly had good reasons to remove Joffrey. Everything she’d heard about him, he was wildly unstable, and he was about to marry her beloved granddaughter. The Queen of Thorns had studied Joffrey well enough that she knew that at some point he would get bored with Margaery, and Margaery would be maltreated, the same way that Sansa had been. Whereas if she removed him then her granddaughter might still get the crown but without all of the danger. So is that a case where the end justifies the means? I don’t know. That’s what I want the reader or viewer to wrestle with, and to debate. 

Joffrey's murder is poised as a moral debate for the reader. It is not written as a mere "yay" point, as in the previous quote, a terrible death of a thirteen-year-old boy. If Joffrey was a mere casualty, then there is no debate. Also, note that statement that Olenna had good reasons.

All the issues you have with the colour of wine or the extra seconds it takes for Joff to start choking, please, take it to GRRM.

 

On a side point: I think the part about Tyrion's big mouth and consequences of one's actions is important - while the Tyrells knew neither him nor Cersei that well, LF would have been able to predict both Tyrion's (and Joff's) reaction to the jousting dwarves as well as Cersei's reaction to her son's death, thus setting Tyrion up as the fall guy and getting rid of him, thus getting rid of 1) Sansa's husband, 2) the single guy who had enough with to disclose his financial machinations, 3) the guy who knew that LF had lied about the dagger, 4) the guy who played LF to find out who Cersei's informant was. And that all while LF's hands are perfectly clean, as he emphasizes to Sansa.

On that "may have more surprises to reveal": IMHO, that concerns the way the poison got into the wine, and has something to do with Olenna being notably short, not much taller than Tyrion, who cannot even reach the chalice without climbing onto his seat.

 

 

 

Unbelievable that you cannot see how all of this proves my point. In one response he talks about the show, the book, and historical precedence. Nowhere in any of this does he say the Lady O of LF intended to kill Joffrey, and he tells you point blank "I make no promises because I have two more books to write, and I have more surprises to reveal".

So you can read all you want to into this, but the facts are the facts. Joffrey's wine was more purple than Cressen's, therefore it was more potent. Littlefinger could not predict where the chalice would be at the only time it could be poisoned, and no one had any compelling reason to want Joffrey dead at this point and every reason to keep him alive.