[Spoilers] Episode 109 Discussion

[Leticia Stark]

They are making Aemond too close of Haelena…. That will make Blood&Cheese mean much more than in the books, I like it.

[dsjj251]

In Universe Book Knowledge:

 

Rhaenyra should have the support of House Baratheon, House Stark, House Arryn, and of course House Velaryon. House Tully should have also been included in that belief, but Old Man Grover broke his vows.  She also had numerous support throughout the Reach as well as the majority of the Crownlands. 

Rhaenys, we can believe, knew this, so why kill Aegon and be seen as a Kinslayer when your belief is basically that its the entire kingdom against the Hightowers and The Westerlands ???


 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

18 minutes ago, butterweedstrover said:

Who care about faith? The shining was not faithful and it was a 100 times better. Maybe Sandman feels off because it was faithful. 

It's supposedly this intense story with god like powers and yet it is incredibly boring, hampered by hours of exposition and these weird 'abstract' fight scenes meant to hide the lack of tension as regards the wider narrative. Just odd people doing odd stuff, no one is going to look back at this show and see a hit series worth investing money into. 

Did you read the comic series before you watched the show?

[butterweedstrover]

6 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Did you read the comic series before you watched the show?

No, and I never will. 

[Adaneth]

2 hours ago, Mark Antony said:

Yeah was a little weird not to go with any of the options F&B presented for Beesbury’s death. Also wish they had leaned into Cole being a “Kingmaker” a bit more than just him being the guy to put the crown on his head at the coronation, 

I can't stand Cole. Bleh! He's lame as hell. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

3 minutes ago, butterweedstrover said:

No, and I never will. 

Your loss.

[Adaneth]

1 hour ago, Khloey said:

I would say every characters on the shows both GOT and HOTD are somewhat whitewashed. It is more striking in HOTD regarding female characters I agree.

But even in GOT, most characters were whitewashed (Tyrion is the most striking example), even Ramsey or Tywin, they're awful, but it's nothing compared to their book counterparts.

Which is one of the main reasons I hated the show. That choice came back to bite them in their azzes later on, big time. lol

[C.T. Phipps]

7 minutes ago, Adaneth said:

Which is one of the main reasons I hated the show. That choice came back to bite them in their azzes later on, big time. lol

I mean their choices only bit them because they wanted to wrap up the show at least two seasons too early.

[MisbornHeir]

9 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

“She and Otto”.  Please recall that Fire and Blood is written as a faux history.  Therefore depending upon it as though it is holy writ is clearly misguided.  It is written after the Dance and after Aegon III (and the Blacks) have won the Dance.  Wouldn’t it paint the Greens in a worse light?  And paint Alicent as scheming with Otto?

This has been my immediate thoughts as of late. Munken had the extremely difficult task of recounting the Dance for historical chonricles but had to appease Aegon's conflicting interests: he was a child of the leaders of the Blacks (Rhaenyra & Daemon) but also saw firsthand what the Dance resulted in for his loved ones 

Spoiler

(namely Sunfyre and Rhaenyra's baking session).

The remaining Hightowers have interests through their patronage of the citadel and being one remaining Great non-paramount houses. And then there's the general issue of not reigniting tensions aflame between any Green or Black sympathizers that were left over from Cregan's purge. 

Yes Condal's version of the Dance ultimately stands as its own canonical retelling of the second Dragon war of succession, looking at it through a lense of historical analysis of biases sources used in a modern dramatization helps for both immersion and believability ( as well as accuracy to real life instances of this). It's just a shame that given this comes from a (as far as we know) fictional universe, the few but noteworthy plot contrivances and resulting conundrums we've had could have been avoided. Or at the very least improve on what George orignally did so that it still made enough sense plot progression wise. 

 

I'm now of the belief that two seasons for the prologue of the Dance would have done better to pace this out correctly. Understandable that this season had a lot to accomplish if it was to be renewed (considering the end reception of GOT) and for the large part it has done remarkably well considering staggered/isolated plot points and large time skips from the book.

 

And hey, you can always turn the tv off after Aegon gets his hurrah's from the smallfolk and proceed to the next episode upon rewatch.

[Ingelheim]

21 minutes ago, Leticia Stark said:

They are making Aemond too close of Haelena…. That will make Blood&Cheese mean much more than in the books, I like it.

Yep, that is probably the angle they are going for. Aemond-Helaena, specially after Rook's Rest, and Alicent and Cole.

Watching the preview from HBO and the supposed leaks, it seems we are getting Aemond vs Lucerys this finale, so maybe they open Season 2 with Blood and Cheese and Daemon using Mysaria also to take revenge on Larys and Otto

[MisbornHeir]

9 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

It's only about politics if you believe politics and culture are interchangeable, which I do not. As I said above, I have defended women and the way they're written on this site enough times that I don't think I need to prove myself. There's no denying the volume of accusations of sexism that were lobbed at GOT, D&D, and GRRM--much of it deserved--to the point where the showrunners for this show discussed it quite extensively in interviews leading up to HOTD's release. They're clearly very wary of having the same thing happen to them, and I think we're starting to see signs of that in the writing.

 

Considering all of those factors in any further creation of ASOIAF adopted media, what would the ideal showrunner do in you mind that would balance all those elements in the best way possible?

[stunningsteve]

6 hours ago, The hairy bear said:

 

• The Septon at the crowning of Aegon doesn't seem the same that married Rhaenyra and Laenor. So one of them can't be Eustace.

According to the close captions, it was Eustace at the coronation in this episode.

The small council scene was a bit disappointing due to the lack of the blood oath and Larys himself. In the books it certainly added some importance to the scene. It was also weird that Alicient was completely clueless about the plans.  Previously she was also on board about the concerns over her children's safety when Rhaenyra comes into power and that was even before the wedding with Daemon and now they seem to be gone completely. I get that she realized her father used that fear to some degree to manipulate her, but it still feels inconsistent.

About her scene with Larys later, it was also weird that she seemingly did not react to his fetish... Did she honestly not notice it, because she was focused on the whole situation or just ignore it, because it was part of their deal for him being useful to her... Overall it just felt weird and unnecessary.

I'm a bit torn about the ending with Rhaenys. It felt pretty stupid to just bust out of the floor and kill dozens of people instead of using one of entrances that are actually made for the dragons. They still could have heard some ruckus in the main  hall because she would have to force the gates to be opened there.

Pretty sure they are going to use the killing of the smallfolk  later in the setup for the Storming of the Dragonpit.

Despite those things it was still pretty good, especially the interaction between Aemond and Aegon was good. As of right now I could certainly see Aemond causing Aegon's injuries at Rook's Rest on purpose.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ran]

Just now, stunningsteve said:

According to the close captions, it was Eustace at the coronation in this episode.

Which one? There was more than one septon. The older one that was speaking, or the younger one that was assisting him?

[stunningsteve]

Just now, Ran said:

Which one? There was more than one septon. The older one that was speaking, or the younger one that was assisting him?

The older one speaking, otherwise there would be no close captions for him  

[Ran]

4 minutes ago, stunningsteve said:

The older one speaking, otherwise there would be no close captions for him  

I didn't recall if the other said anything or not, but fair enough.

  

6 minutes ago, stunningsteve said:

About her scene with Larys later, it was also weird that she seemingly did not react to his fetish... Did she honestly not notice it, because she was focused on the whole situation or just ignore it, because it was part of their deal for him being useful to her... Overall it just felt weird and unnecessary.

It's clear that this has been their ongoing transaction for awhile.  

Edited October 17, 2022 by Ran

[Adaneth]

15 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

I mean their choices only bit them because they wanted to wrap up the show at least two seasons too early.

It's not like they planned for 10 or 12 seasons, and they made some crucial changes very early on. Dany spent S5&S6 on "breaking the wheel" crap, and S7 on "bend the knee." Arya had no story after S4, idem Tyrion, not to mention Bran. The list is long. It wasn't just about lack of time, IMO. 

GRRM is spot on when he speaks about the butterfly effect. 

Edited October 17, 2022 by Adaneth

[MisbornHeir]

8 hours ago, DMC said:

The other side of the coin on the terrible stupidity of nobility - it wouldn't have been honorable.

Rationalizing your actions regardless of the inherent sensibility present in order to have allevement of one's conscious.

It's something I witness often and especially as of late. Those in positions of power often must employ it to keep their sanity.

[nara]

10 hours ago, Colonel Green said:

Why? Everybody there has already made up their minds.

Honestly, I didn’t feel the urgency coming out of the meeting, the frantic need to find allies before the Princess even realized her father was even dead. I thought more debate about who could and couldn’t be counted on, when to send a raven, etc might have helped.

[Khloey]

Just now, Adaneth said:

It's not like they planned for 10 or 12 seasons, and they made some crucial changes very early on. Dany spent the S5&S6 on "breaking the wheel" crap, and S7 on "bend the knee." Arya had no story after S4, idem Tyrion, not to mention Bran. The list is long. It wasn't just lack of time, IMO. 

GRRM is spot on when he speaks about the butterfly effect. 

Yes, totally agree. I don't even want to talk about Dorne's storyline in season 5 cause I get really depressed.

I think I started to yell at my screen mid season 4, when it was clear they couldn't handle clever characters like Littlefinger. And given what happened to Tyrion, Varys, or Doran, I was right to be worried by then.

[The Bard of Banefort]

11 minutes ago, MisbornHeir said:

Considering all of those factors in any further creation of ASOIAF adopted media, what would the ideal showrunner do in you mind that would balance all those elements in the best way possible?

Allow the women to be full-fledged human beings. That’s part of what fans love about ASOIAF.