spoilers [Spoilers] Episode 101 Discussion

[Frey family reunion]

10 hours ago, Ran said:

I really think they went well beyond George's actual intent in the novels, though, and turned it into a very straightforward, blunt instrument. I suspect its rather more nuanced, as I've discussed elsewhere.

I'd be interested in a link to your thoughts on that.  The biggest clue that Rhaegar was interested in trying to stop another Long Night is Aemon's relating the Prince that was Promised prophecy to the Battle for the Dawn.  

So that begs the question, how long have the Targaryens believed that the Prince that was Promised prophecy was directly linked to their family?

It's a thousand year old prophecy, so it's kind of odd that it would be linked back then to the Valyrians, since the Valyrians didn't have princes a thousand years ago.  Of course their enemies did.  Especially the Rhoynes.  It was also a thousand years ago when the Valyrians destroyed the Rhoynish civilization.  Usually tales of future messiahs come from civilizations that feel oppressed in the present day.

So is it a coincidence that the Prince that was Promised prophecy seems to only become of interest to the Targaryen family, after the Targaryens have married a Dornish, i.e. Rhoynish, bride?  Is it a coincidence that Rhaegar believes his son with his Dornish wife is slated to be the Prince that was Promised?

[C.T. Phipps]

49 minutes ago, Relic said:

Wondered about that as well. Does anyone have any ideas? Looking at you @Ran 

I took them as voting stones.

Which implies a number of things:

1. Viserys runs his council on a voting system, implying a much weaker king.

2. It's much more formal than in Robert's time with objects of office.

3. Viserys is attempting to run via consensus despite the system allowing him to appoint/dismiss/overrule at will.

[C.T. Phipps]

42 minutes ago, Ser Drewy said:

I thought it was okay. The C-section scene was powerful. However, none of the characters were immediately interesting like the Starks or Tyrion, or Dany. I thought some of the violence was a bit tryhard - how many faces did we see mashed in? - and I don't understand why the tourney got murderous, or why it was allowed to continue. The dragons looked good. Truthfully I kinda left it feeling like not a lot happened in the hour. 

I lol'd at the Long Night prophecy. The bad aroma of GOT is still there and all I can think is: yep, the dark winter is coming... for one day. 

This is Westeros and all of these lords and knights are trying to impress the King because, due to the long peace, none of them will get any glory unless they actually prove it here. Rhaenys comments on the fact they're all Summer Knights because they're unaware of war and think this is the height of "real" combat.

The joke being Viserys has already left by the time people start dying and Rhaenys isn't going to stop it. She's UNIMPRESSED by the violence.

[StarksInTheNorth]

7 hours ago, miyuki said:

You know, most people who are against the blackwashing of house Velaryon are committed book fans who are also upset over every other change (no matter how insignificant) from the source material too, like Syrio not being bald or Arya being Tywin's cupbearer. Claiming only racists and trolls have an issue with that is dishonest.

Well luckily I never said only! Again, some people are capable of engaging with nuance but plenty aren’t. if someone is still hung up on the race switch over a year past the announcement, then they maybe should go touch grass. 

[StarksInTheNorth]

5 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

I took them as voting stones.

Which implies a number of things:

1. Viserys runs his council on a voting system, implying a much weaker king.

2. It's much more formal than in Robert's time with objects of office.

3. Viserys is attempting to run via consensus despite the system allowing him to appoint/dismiss/overrule at will.

^^^ all of this. It will also potentially add some more flavor to the “should we tell Rhaenyra” scene. Maybe Beesbury vote yes first, and then instead of anyone else voting, the Defenestration of Prague is brought into the real world. 

[Lord Varys]

Thinking a little bit more about the episode I think structure-wise it was a massive mistake to cramp into the succession issue after Aemma's death. They should have ended the episode there, with perhaps ending on the note of a completely shattered Viserys and Rhaenyra.

That way they could have played up the tourney some more, perhaps add a scene about Criston Cole arriving in the city, being determined to make an impression. Also, there would have been time to add an audience scene where the lords of the great houses who arrived interacted with the king.

Regarding racial issues:

I think there is a pretty big weirdo vibe there since, apparently, black Valyrians are normal ... but a guy looking like everybody else to my eye is immediately recognized by Alicent as 'Dornish'. If black Valyrians are thing, then dark(er)-skinned, mixed people would have been a common sight in KL and the Crownlands since the arrival of the Velaryons and the Targaryens centuries ago. With them coming to power and prominence this would have also affected how 'Dornish-looking' people would have been viewed in KL, especially by somebody who grew up there, like Alicent.

You could differentiate between a Dornishman and a Kingslander/Crownlander of black Valyrian descent.

There one sees how the racial slurs/xenophobia/anti-Dornish sentiment in the Reach and the Stormlands that's very much a thing in Westeros even in the books (but much more, one imagines, in the times before Daeron II) is at odds on a conceptual level with this Velaryon changes. How this ended up affecting worldbuilding consistency and coherence even after one single episode.

[Corvinus85]

16 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

This is Westeros and all of these lords and knights are trying to impress the King because, due to the long peace, none of them will get any glory unless they actually prove it here. Rhaenys comments on the fact they're all Summer Knights because they're unaware of war and think this is the height of "real" combat.

The joke being Viserys has already left by the time people start dying and Rhaenys isn't going to stop it. She's UNIMPRESSED by the violence.

Sure, but tourneys are fairly often. Some of these knights likely demonstrated their skills before.

[Lord Varys]

Thinking more about the tourney violence - it could have worked much better if we had heard that lords and knights were coming fighting out their own private conflicts there in the only way they can since they are not allowed to go to war. Still a stretch, but something that could have made sense. Say, we could have had an iteration of the Bracken-Blackwood feud in the lists.

[Mithras]

Whitewashing of Cersei vs. whitewashing of Alicent. GoT is truly back 

[sifth]

I’m a little confused by the tourney violence. Were people allowed to actually kill each other in this tourney? It certainly looked like they were. 

Edited August 22, 2022 by sifth

[Takiedevushkikakzvezdy]

I thought the Kingsguard armor looked a bit too science fiction-y to me. Like something more out of the Dune movie than ASOIAF.

[C.T. Phipps]

14 minutes ago, sifth said:

I’m a little confused by the tourney violence. Were people allowed to actually kill each other in this tourney? It certainly looked like they were. 

Accidents happen.

But the thing is that the crowd was loving it and no one was stopping it. Probably because Viserys wasn't there.

Rhaenys and Rhaenyra were into it as was the Crown Prince and the crowd.

[Corvinus85]

8 minutes ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

I thought the Kingsguard armor looked a bit too science fiction-y to me. Like something more out of the Dune movie than ASOIAF.

Ha, I complained about that when the first photos were revealed. The helmets remind me of Starship Troopers.

[C.T. Phipps]

23 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Thinking more about the tourney violence - it could have worked much better if we had heard that lords and knights were coming fighting out their own private conflicts there in the only way they can since they are not allowed to go to war. Still a stretch, but something that could have made sense. Say, we could have had an iteration of the Bracken-Blackwood feud in the lists.

Frankly, I think that people are overstating the issue. We know Westeros is a hyper-violent exaggerated version of the real world.

Besides, we don't know who is dead and who isn't.

A few deaths is not something exceptional for this setting.

[Takiedevushkikakzvezdy]

Just now, Corvinus85 said:

Ha, I complained about that when the first photos were revealed. The helmets remind me of Starship Troopers.

I actually think they looked better on GoT.

[C.T. Phipps]

28 minutes ago, Corvinus85 said:

Sure, but tourneys are fairly often. Some of these knights likely demonstrated their skills before.

True but a King's Tournament for the birth of his heir is a different matter, unlike Robert, this is basically an Olympics level generational event.

[BlackLightning]

This was a good episode. It wasn't absolutely mindblowing or extraordinary. But it was good; really good.

I was pleasantly surprised in many cases.

I liked it. I think the pacing of the episode was good. The first episode of HotD was definitely better and more engaging than the first episode of GoT.

17 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Thinking a little bit more about the episode I think structure-wise it was a massive mistake to cramp into the succession issue after Aemma's death. They should have ended the episode there, with perhaps ending on the note of a completely shattered Viserys and Rhaenyra.

 

I agree.

I love what they did with Queen Aemma. I love the emphasis that they had put on childbirth, pregnancy and medieval healthcare in the show. This show definitely feels more like Westeros than GoT did.

But I think this episode should have been 15 minutes longer. We definitely should've had Daemon's speech in the brothel shown in full while it was intercut with Otto's retelling of it. And we should've had more time for Rhaenyra mourn the deaths of her mother and brother and blame her father. We saw Otto, Alicent, Viserys and even Daemon in multiple scenes express feelings of grief, disappointment and anguish...but not much from Rhaenyra. Maybe we'll more of that in other episodes.

 

I also think that it would've gone over better for this episode to actually show us Viserys' dreams (particularly the last one about the Long Night) rather than have Viserys tell us. Having Viserys tells us makes him look strange versus seeing his dreams and watching him recount it would have made him look more inspired.

52 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

The joke being Viserys has already left by the time people start dying and Rhaenys isn't going to stop it. She's UNIMPRESSED by the violence.

I'm so glad to know that I wasn't the only one who caught that.

Viserys would've stopped it from getting out of  hand like Robert Baratheon did. But Rhaenys has the stomach and the mind for it...but it was all very mid for her. So she let it continue; because as the next most senior member of House Targaryen present, she could've stopped it.

28 minutes ago, sifth said:

I’m a little confused by the tourney violence. Were people allowed to actually kill each other in this tourney? It certainly looked like they were. 

Yes.

It is implied that Rhaenys allowed it to continue and escalate.

It's  nice that we got a bit of a taste of what Queen Rhaenys I would have been like.

[Lord Varys]

6 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

Frankly, I think that people are overstating the issue. We know Westeros is a hyper-violent exaggerated version of the real world.

Besides, we don't know who is dead and who isn't.

A few deaths is not something exceptional for this setting.

For me, it is mostly the apparent absence of rules. So you joust and then, when something goes bad for you and you get angry you butcher the opponent? That's just weird as hell.

[Takiedevushkikakzvezdy]

13 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

We know Westeros is a hyper-violent exaggerated version of the real world.

Although GRRM often says that those who think that his books are too violent haven't read much about the real Middle Ages.

[C.T. Phipps]

4 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

For me, it is mostly the apparent absence of rules. So you joust and then, when something goes bad for you and you get angry you butcher the opponent? That's just weird as hell.

I mean the announcer says Daemon is continuing the fight so its apparently a thing.