Jon will never be king.

[SeanF]

36 minutes ago, DarkBastard said:

Perhaps you didnt see in episode 4 when Missandei gave her speech to Jon and Davos about them choosing Dany, not because she is the daughter of some king they never knew.

Or do you not think that is a particularly important plot point...just filler...just to fill in some gaps because they have sooo much free screen time available this season?

It is meant to draw a parallel to Jon's journey, and to show that choosing is more important than bloodlines.  The Maesters will be concerned with bloodlines, not the people.  I think your logic is flawed or you simply refuse to accept anything but your own opinion...even when the show is putting it in your face like that.

Daenerys (or less likely Jon) may receive some form of acclamation from the people of Kings Landing, but the public won't really be choosing her to rule over them.  She will rule by right of descent and/or conquest.

Missandei can choose to leave her service, but that's not a choice that's open to the Smallfolk of Westeros.

 

[Lord Varys]

41 minutes ago, DarkBastard said:

Perhaps you didnt see in episode 4 when Missandei gave her speech to Jon and Davos about them choosing Dany, not because she is the daughter of some king they never knew.

Or do you not think that is a particularly important plot point...just filler...just to fill in some gaps because they have sooo much free screen time available this season?

It is meant to draw a parallel to Jon's journey, and to show that choosing is more important than bloodlines.  The Maesters will be concerned with bloodlines, not the people.  I think your logic is flawed or you simply refuse to accept anything but your own opinion...even when the show is putting it in your face like that.

That is Dany's journey, not Jon's. And Dany won the allegiance of truly foreign people, unlike Jon who basically rules over the people his family has ruled over since time immemorial. 

The show might parallel Dany and Jon as two monarchs chosen by their people. It should be true for Dany in the books, but not for Jon.

[Lord Varys]

2 minutes ago, SeanF said:

Daenerys (or less likely Jon) may receive some form of acclamation from the people of Kings Landing, but the public won't really be choosing her to rule over them.  She will rule by right of descent and/or conquest.

Missandei can choose to leave her service, but that's not a choice that's open to the Smallfolk of Westeros.

 

In the show the smallfolk of Westeros would choose neither Jon nor Daenerys because there are no Targaryen loyalists (left) in Westeros. They all hate those pricks there, and they will sure as hell hate Jon, too, once they learn that he is a Targaryen prince, too. There is no reason to believe the grandson of the Mad King should be more popular in the South than his daughter.

At least not in this show where everybody seems to be living in the distant past, ignoring the insane crimes and betrayals of House Lannister.

[SeanF]

2 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

In the show the smallfolk of Westeros would choose neither Jon nor Daenerys because there are no Targaryen loyalists (left) in Westeros. They all hate those pricks there, and they will sure as hell hate Jon, too, once they learn that he is a Targaryen prince, too. There is no reason to believe the grandson of the Mad King should be more popular in the South than his daughter.

At least not in this show where everybody seems to be living in the distant past, ignoring the insane crimes and betrayals of House Lannister.

No one seems to bat an eyelid at Cersei's massacre of hundreds of people in the Great Sept, and the surrounding district.

You might at least expect to see riots that have to be crushed by Lannister soldiers. In reality, you'd expect to see Lannister soldiers defecting, given the balance of power, and the fact that Cersei has done nothing to win their support.  The only thing that would keep them loyal would be if  Dany was carrying out massacres of her own.

[Lord Varys]

8 minutes ago, SeanF said:

No one seems to bat an eyelid at Cersei's massacre of hundreds of people in the Great Sept, and the surrounding district.

You might at least expect to see riots that have to be crushed by Lannister soldiers. In reality, you'd expect to see Lannister soldiers defecting, given the balance of power, and the fact that Cersei has done nothing to win their support.  The only thing that would keep them loyal would be if  Dany was carrying out massacres of her own.

Exactly.

But it is even worse. If they had this much power left in mindless drone soldiers why on earth had we to suffer the speeches of the High Sparrow for two fucking seasons. They could have dealt with the sparrows and the Tyrells in just a minute. Remember that they were dependent on Tyrell soldiers when they wanted to break Margaery out of the Great Sept?

This whole thing is so ridiculously badly planned and written that I really wonder why people actually enjoy watching this. I only continue because, you know, book obsession and all. But if this were just a TV show like any other I'd not drag myself through this shit.

[DarkBastard]

You guys aren't seeing the bigger picture.  I'll re-engage with you after these events play out.

[the tower of albion]

My interpretation of the dragon has three heads is a king a queen and the hand. The realm is the dragon. So if Jon and Dany hook up why shouldn't he be king.

[Nic.]

According to the show he probably will be, after all according to them he's a good ruler and Dany is a bad one.  See Sansa and Daario's quotes. lol 

[Lurid Jester]

I generally try to steer clear of these kinds of character hate-ons/love-ons, but technically he's already King. 

So, there's that. 

[Lord Okra]

11 hours ago, Skahaz mo Kandaq said:

Jon will never be king.  For one thing, he's unfit to rule.  He's not cut out for it.  He's not smart enough and he's too crude. 

That was a poor decision to put those kids in charge of the Karhold and the Last Hearth.  Those children are not capable of leading the defense against the WW and their wights.  It's a poor decision and prideful to refuse to kneel to the one person who has the resources that he needs desperately. 

Jon has never won a battle that he led.  Stannis Baratheon bailed his butt from the wildlings when the savages attacked the wall.  The victory over Ramsay Bolton wasn't Jon's.  LittleFinger won that battle.  That was a victory for House Baelish because LF bailed Jon from certain defeat. (A little gratitude to LF  would have been nice and polite).  Ramsay was two steps ahead of Jon in every way in that battle.  Some people may forgive him for breaking his vows to the NW but many will not. 

Jon is already King.

He's been a King since the end of last season.

Saying Jon will never be king ignores that he is already king.

He's actually more of a king right now than Cersie or Dany are Queens right now.  Cersie and Dany basically are Queens without a kingdom while Jon is actually....functionally.....King of an actual kingdom.

The seven kingdoms (that Dany and Cersie both claim to rule) doesn't even exist at this point other than on paper.

Basically, as of today.....Dany and Cersie are "paper Queens" while Jon is an actual King.

 

[TheMachine]

12 hours ago, Skahaz mo Kandaq said:

Jon will never be king.  For one thing, he's unfit to rule.  He's not cut out for it.  He's not smart enough and he's too crude. 

But he already is King (otN) 

[Jeeves]

6 hours ago, Dawn of Fyre said:

You seem biased. Jon failed at the wall - in the books at least - because he was not able to communicate with his underlings in a proper manner regarding the true threat to Westeros, George said as much. He has the potential to be a great king, with the good counselors backing him. To claim he would be a terrible king is wrong. He allowed the wildings through because he saw that leaving them to die would only added to the army of the dead. My criticism of his command would be that he was not able to convince the others in regard to the aforementioned statement. Perhaps Allister Thorn was like iron, unable to bend to the truth around him. He gave his whole life for the watch, fighting against Wildlings, and he could not see past his own selfishness and accept that Wildings south of the wall was the most logical and humane choice.

Even in the books, when Jon decides to march south against Ramsay (because he wanted to save Arya), he rationalized it in that Ramsay would march north and destroy the Night's Watch, thus destroying the only defense of the Wall. 

Jon Snowhead picked that fight.  He started that war with Ramsay.  All that grief and tragedy just for Arya or who he thought was Arya.  Sending wildling thugs to steal Arya away was a act of war and would have been taken by such by anybody.

This topic is much to complex to simply state he was a bad Lord Commander.

Jon was the worst lord commander since the Night's King.

 

[RhaenysBee]

4 hours ago, norwaywolf123 said:

hopefully fanservice will not translate into the books.

The books won't be finished, so no. 

But generally fanservice isn't past books either. Cough Harry Potter Epilogue Cough. And it is known that GRRM is a Tyrion/Jon/Daenerys fanboy too. I'm not saying He would go to the Harry Potter epilogue length with that but the possibility is there. 

[Capo Ferro]

3 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

It was? That's simply not true. Jon was chosen to be Mormont's steward and squire because he was the Bastard of Winterfell. And that's also the reason why the men chose him to be Lord Commander. 

I don't think there's much support for that claim in either the books or the show.  In both, Jon showed real leadership and in both it seems pretty clear that's why he made it to the position he was in. 

He arrived at Castle Black and was immediately mocked by Thorne and others as Lord Snow -- his ability to relate to the other members of the Night's Watch as brothers was, before he really had a chance to do anything, undermined by Thorne who sought to portray him as a graduate of fancy lad school (to borrow Bronn's expression).  Despite this (though with the advice of Tyrion) he was able to win the friendship and loyalty of people who'd despised him and the fear and respect of those who were determined not to be friends.  He also won the friendship of some wildlings and the respect of Mance Rayder.  He organized a successful defense of Castle Black when it was under attack from the south where it was weak.  And when the watch was hopelessly outnumbered and it seemed likely that they'd eventually fall simply because they lacked the power to man the wall he took on a suicide mission to kill Mance Rayder.  In the end he didn't and didn't have to because help came from an unexpected quarter (in answer to his call, a call that was sensibly directed to all the claimants to the throne, not just the unreliable one in King's landing).  And he made the difficult and dangerous decision (which we who benefit from the author's omniscience and see everything know to be the right decision even if folks in the story with an incomplete grasp of the situation believe is the wrong one) to let the wildlings behind the wall. 

And then there's Sam.  A leader has to use the tools he has and find the value in unpromising material.  Jon, like the other military men of the watch, was disgusted by Sam's cowardice but unlike, say, Thorne, he recognized that Sam nevertheless had value to the watch.

He had notable failures too.  His abortive attempt to fly south and join his brother and, in the books if not the show, his apparent decision to attack Ramsey Bolton. 

But in the books and in the show as far as the books carried them it's hard to come up with examples of anyone who's shown more actual leadership than Snow.  That, I grant, is a low bar but it's true. 

And Mormont saw Snow win the friendship of folks that has been his enemy and work to make them into a respectable fighting force and that is why Mormont made him steward.  And by the time of the election to Lord Commander a great many members of the watch recognized their debt to him.  Others despised him of course but that too is something that can be a consequence of leadership. 

Since the show has departed from the books he's made decisions that have been questionable.  The seeds for those decisions can be found in his character as set out in the books.  He's not an unambiguously perfect ruler.  But we've seen a lot of folks who have clearly been worse.

[Dragonsbone]

5 hours ago, DarkBastard said:

So you think his bloodline made him King in the North??  His bloodline made him Lord Commander?  He was chosen by the people around him for those roles, "having Ned Stark's blood" was secondary to that.

 

"I don't care if he is a bastard, Ned Starks blood runs through his veins". That was the line, Lyana Mormont used to declare Jon the King in the North. His blood is the reason that he is the King.  We have a feudalistic monarchy, not a Meritocracy or Democracy in Westeros. 

[DarkBastard]

8 minutes ago, Dragonsbone said:

"I don't care if he is a bastard, Ned Starks blood runs through his veins". That was the line, Lyana Mormont used to declare Jon the King in the North. His blood is the reason that he is the King.  We have a feudalistic monarchy, not a Meritocracy or Democracy in Westeros. 

By choosing to ignore the fact that he is a bastard, they are ignoring the rules of monarchy.  He is not a legitimate heir based on the rules you are citing.  You think if he had not led them all to re-take the North, they would have still named him King?  If he had shown cowardice during the battle of the bastards instead of courage and valor, do you think they would have named him King?  Based on what you are saying, they would have.  You're wrong to think that merit has nothing to do with chosen leadership in the absence of a ruler.

[TheMachine]

30 minutes ago, Capo Ferro said:

 In the end he didn't and didn't have to because help came from an unexpected quarter (in answer to his call, a call that was sensibly directed to all the claimants to the throne, not just the unreliable one in King's landing).  And he made the difficult and dangerous decision (which we who benefit from the author's omniscience and see everything know to be the right decision even if folks in the story with an incomplete grasp of the situation believe is the wrong one) to let the wildlings behind the wall. 

This is great. I couldn't agree more with this summation.

[Lord Varys]

33 minutes ago, Capo Ferro said:

I don't think there's much support for that claim in either the books or the show.  In both, Jon showed real leadership and in both it seems pretty clear that's why he made it to the position he was in. 

Jon is basically the one-eyed king among the blind. He is decent and capable guy but no genius or exceptional man. He isn't Daeron I or Tywin Lannister, and certainly not Jaehaerys I or Aegon the Conqueror.

To excel among the Night's Watch - the place where you dump the scum from all across the Realm - isn't exactly that great of a feature. Alliser Thorne is just thug, if you beat him in anything you are not suddenly the sharpest knife in the box. 

Jon is really smarter and has a larger vision than the likes of Bowen Marsh and Othell Yarwyck but that doesn't mean he is the same league as the people playing the game in KL. 

It is his ancestry that allows him to capitalize on the few things he does right. Let's assume Pyp or Grenn had been the ones ending up defending the Wall after Donal Noye's death - nobody would have suggested to make them Lord Commander. And if somebody had done that they wouldn't have been elected. Hell, the one reason why Qhorin Halfhand allowed Jon to go with him on that ranging is his ancestry and his looks - he is Benjen Stark's nephew and the Bastard of Winterfell.

The idea that Jon could be a great king is comparable to the idea that a guy who could be come the mayor of some village or a small time in some rural backwater place could also manage a city like New York - without ever being there or having any connections there.

The fact that Jon made himself some friends at the Wall, beyond the Wall, and even in the North (Alys Karstark, some chieftains of the clansmen) doesn't mean he is also going to make friends down in the South nor that those friends are going to be able to help him take the Iron Throne.

Him knowing Tyrion certainly can help him hook up with Dany later on. But him knowing Tyrion is going to help him with becoming king. I'm pretty sure Tyrion would prefer to sit the Iron Throne himself before he would offer it to Jon - claim or no claim.

And the same goes for pretty much any other nobleman down in the South.

The overwhelming majority of those people would most likely thank Jon if he defeated the Others for them. But they would not thank him by making him their king. Rather by giving him a clap on the back and saying something like 'Thank you, lad. And no go back home to Winterfell (or to the Wall) where you belong.'

I'd like the idea of some guy rising through the ranks based mostly or exclusively on his or her merits. But Jon isn't that guy. Davos comes closest to this whole thing which is one of the reason why I'd like to see him as the Hand in the end (the real Davos, not the TV caricature who should have died with Stannis). But even Davos has connections - to Stannis, just as Littlefinger had connections to Lysa and later Jon Arryn. Pretty much all the characters of humbler beginnings rose to power because they made connections to the powerful. Even Varys was invited by Aerys II to become his Master of Whisperers. Although we can say that Varys/Illyrio are perhaps the only real self-made men in the series, considering that they had very humble beginnings and rose to power and influence as crime lords, basically.

But there you also see where a career ends. Littlefinger could only become a great lord in a crisis, and Varys can never rise this high. He is a eunuch and a foreigner of low birth. And neither of them, Davos included, could ever dream of being king in their own right. That would be insane in that society.

If Jon actually were nothing but a Stark bastard, the son of Eddard Stark's on some whore or tavern girl he would be king in this world, no matter what he did.

[the tower of albion]

21 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

 But him knowing Tyrion is going to help him with becoming king. I'm pretty sure Tyrion would prefer to sit the Iron Throne himself before he would offer it to Jon - claim or no claim.

But Tyrion would sit on the Iron Throne as the Hand. The Hand  is the de facto ruler. Jon Snows marriage to Dany legitimises her  (technically being an outlander) whilst allowing the two halves of the realm to stitch back together a north man rather than a southron lord to avoid any jealousies and rivalries. Every one is satisfied with the pact of ice and fire - Jon and Dany travel the realm fostering  peace and reconstruction and breaking the wheel. (what ever that means)

[Dragonsbone]

I am really confused by the discussion right now. I thought we are talking about the show. But a lot of arguements here, are based on the books. So which Jon are we speaking of? And just to be clear: There is no way that Jons story arch will have a different ending in the books then in the Show (Main plot, ending etc., not detaills). Except of course GRRM changes his story, which is possible, but highly unlikely.