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What about the rest of the world?


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Someone brought this point up in another thread but it sort of got lost amongst the posts so I thought I’d raise the question again.

Last episode Bran told us that the Night King wants “an endless night” and “to erase this world” - to eliminate mankind and its memory by eliminating Bran. But the whole Night King/COTF/Three Eyed Raven story line seems very Westeros-centric. Do the Three Eyed Raven’s powers even extend beyond Westeros? I can’t recall Bran ever having visions that took place elsewhere (though I could very well have just forgotten). Are the 3ER’s powers dependent on weir woods? Are there weir woods outside of Westeros? If not, then it seems like it may be more accurate to say that Bran is the memory of Westeros, rather than the world (unless by saying “this world” he meant the world of Westeros?). Then the Night King wouldn’t be able to erase the mankind/it’s memory by killing Bran, he’d only be destroying a part of it.

I fear I may be overthinking this whole thing now and won’t get any satisfactory explanation from the show, but would like to know others' thoughts on this.

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I've thought about this, too. In the books there are stories from other cultures about a long night and a savior coming, which all parallel the stories in Westeros about the Long Night and the Final Hero. So something happened long ago that affected them all. 

Some of this is an issue with how things are presented in the books versus how they are presented on the show, but my theory is that in the show the 3ER really does see everything in that world. The Night King intends to take over the rest of the world after killing the 3ER and taking over Westeros.

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6 hours ago, a girl knows nothing said:

Someone brought this point up in another thread but it sort of got lost amongst the posts so I thought I’d raise the question again.

Last episode Bran told us that the Night King wants “an endless night” and “to erase this world” - to eliminate mankind and its memory by eliminating Bran. But the whole Night King/COTF/Three Eyed Raven story line seems very Westeros-centric. Do the Three Eyed Raven’s powers even extend beyond Westeros? I can’t recall Bran ever having visions that took place elsewhere (though I could very well have just forgotten). Are the 3ER’s powers dependent on weir woods? Are there weir woods outside of Westeros? If not, then it seems like it may be more accurate to say that Bran is the memory of Westeros, rather than the world (unless by saying “this world” he meant the world of Westeros?). Then the Night King wouldn’t be able to erase the mankind/it’s memory by killing Bran, he’d only be destroying a part of it.

I fear I may be overthinking this whole thing now and won’t get any satisfactory explanation from the show, but would like to know others' thoughts on this.


It is an interesting question. I don't think weirwoods exist in another part of the world, and I think the story of the 3ER is valid only for Westeros.  In Essos weirwoods are not mentioned. But Essos has its cults, like red priests, mages, maybe wizards, those who maybe can see the past, or the future, like Quaithe or like the undead from Qarth. Everything we know it's that the Long Night it's mentioned in the legends from Essos and Azor Ahai, who defeated the previous Long Night is a hero from Essos. It is said that he fought with the demons sent on earth by a god. We don't know what kind of creatures they were. But they were create and sent to destroy humankind. Exactly like White Walkers.

And more than that we don't know what is beyond of the realms of always winter, but logically there can be only the realms in the north-east of Essos. So, basicaly, the WW and the wight can reach Essos on ice. Of course is only my speculation.

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9 minutes ago, loverofcats said:

And more than that we don't know what is beyond of the realms of always winter, but logically there can be only the realms in the north-east of Essos. So, basicaly, the WW and the wight can reach Essos on ice. Of course is only my speculation.

No, there can also be an ocean, which is the most likely scenario. Not to mention that GRRM has stated that Essos and Westeros are not connected.

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20 minutes ago, T and A said:

No, there can also be an ocean, which is the most likely scenario. Not to mention that GRRM has stated that Essos and Westeros are not connected.

I agree. But I suppose there's an arctic ice linking the two continents.  Something like the North Pole.

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The World of Ice & Fire mentions the Rhoyne freezing over quite a bit down south during the Long Night. so when KL freezes over, Essos should be passable from the north.

But I don't think the TV show will focus on Essos much (probably not at all), especially not next episode with the Winterfell battle and then there are only 3 more episodes. Should the people evacuate to Essos in a severe defeat then they'll start talking about it, but I doubt that scenario was on D&D's table.

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I lightheartedly speculated in another thread that the Titan of Braavos and the Dothraki horse statues, etc., could come to life - for whatever values of "life" exist in Planetos - and join the fun. Realistically I doubt it will happen. Activity is contracting to a couple of key nodes, and 4 episodes won't give much time to revisit old ground.

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3 hours ago, Squall said:

The World of Ice & Fire mentions the Rhoyne freezing over quite a bit down south during the Long Night. so when KL freezes over, Essos should be passable from the north.

But I don't think the TV show will focus on Essos much (probably not at all), especially not next episode with the Winterfell battle and then there are only 3 more episodes. Should the people evacuate to Essos in a severe defeat then they'll start talking about it, but I doubt that scenario was on D&D's table.

The World of Ice and Fire also makes mention of the Five Forts at the northeastern border of Yi Ti.  1,000 foot high walls of fused black stone rumored to have been built long in the past to guard against something called the 'Lion of Night'.

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I always wondered why this world (Planetos?) seems to be stuck in the iron age for tens of thousands of years and they never have any type of industrial revolution. Having a "hard reset" every thousand years like the Night King could explain it.

The Lord of the Rings was like magic vs. modernization. You can't have both and in the end magic loses. Maybe Martin is trying to create a story where magic wins. The Night King depends on magic to survive, so he must send the planet back to the stone age every few thousand years to prevent man from completely destroying all the magic. Bran is just a living repository of history and needs to be destroyed as part of the reset. 

 

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On 4/27/2019 at 12:48 AM, Dragon Glass said:

a "hard reset"

I think this spec has considerable merit. The threat of extinction-level event for humankind is popular - zombies, killer apes, pandemic, aliens, The Rapture, rise of the machines, bad weather, or any combination thereof. I'm too lazy to go see if there's a page on TV Tropes, but I'm confident there is one. :D

The fun for the viewer comes from imagining themselves and their nearest & dearest coming through such a catastrophe unharmed (or at least semi-functional). Which explains the "who lives, who fries" theories, which one-true-pairings will survive, et cetera.

I'm doing my darndest trying not to overthink any of this, and I'm trying to avoid falling prey to groupthink, so I'll wait till after the 3rd ep airs before commenting further.

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On 4/26/2019 at 3:48 PM, Dragon Glass said:

I always wondered why this world (Planetos?) seems to be stuck in the iron age for tens of thousands of years and they never have any type of industrial revolution. Having a "hard reset" every thousand years like the Night King could explain it.

For most of the past 5000 years the Valyrian Freehold dominated, Magic and dragons were the key to military success not small improvements in forging steel or better windmills. In our real history, technology often went backwards think of the "dark ages" in western Europe, there were a great many other events of civilisations collapsing. 

Long winter of several years will wipe out a significant part of your population that would seriously impede the ability to build up the functional surpluses required for a large literate class. 

Also much of the world is dependent on slavery for power, again in our history this traditionally reduces incentives to innovate. 

But I doubt the show has gone to this level of thinking. GRRM might have its a key theme in "big history" and he has an interest in that area. 

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On 4/25/2019 at 3:44 PM, a girl knows nothing said:

Someone brought this point up in another thread but it sort of got lost amongst the posts so I thought I’d raise the question again.

Last episode Bran told us that the Night King wants “an endless night” and “to erase this world” - to eliminate mankind and its memory by eliminating Bran. But the whole Night King/COTF/Three Eyed Raven story line seems very Westeros-centric. Do the Three Eyed Raven’s powers even extend beyond Westeros? I can’t recall Bran ever having visions that took place elsewhere (though I could very well have just forgotten). Are the 3ER’s powers dependent on weir woods? Are there weir woods outside of Westeros? If not, then it seems like it may be more accurate to say that Bran is the memory of Westeros, rather than the world (unless by saying “this world” he meant the world of Westeros?). Then the Night King wouldn’t be able to erase the mankind/it’s memory by killing Bran, he’d only be destroying a part of it.

I fear I may be overthinking this whole thing now and won’t get any satisfactory explanation from the show, but would like to know others' thoughts on this.

Melisandre comes to Westeros because she believes the Great War is here and that Stannis is Azor Ahai. She also helps convince Stannis of the threat of the undead beyond the Wall. 

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Why do people still think that there has to be a bridge or that oceans have to freeze in order for the NK to destroy Essos or any place else? Every populated place in their world has one thing in common, dead people. Most places bury the dead.

The NK has a dragon that he can fly across the narrow sea. Once there, raises all of the dead there and bingo a new army of the dead anywhere he flies to. No need for freezing oceans, getting ships or magical land bridges to appear. He could just let them loose and move on.

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