Arya, the Darkheart

[Rondo]

Arya is only going to get worse.  Her character arc is heading in a direction where she will continue to murder people.  And yes, Dareon qualifies as an innocent casualty of Arya's madness. 

[Darth Sidious]

On 11/27/2022 at 12:27 PM, Nevets said:

Arya is not insane, as the term is supposed to be used, but she is hardly in good mental health either.  She clearly has issues; normal children do not kill people who aren't a threat to them or anyone else.  Come to think on it, they generally don't kill those who are a threat either, not that that is relevant here.

Fortunately, I think her problems are mainly the result of recent experiences and her current environment.  Simply being in a normal environment should help.  Having a mentor like Brienne or Jon would be useful as well, but knowing GRRM I wouldn't count on it.

I would be quite shocked and disappointed if she began to kill innocents or even became a real assassin.  And by innocents I mean people Arya has no reason to believe are wrongdoers.  Dareon doesn't qualify; desertion is a capital offense where she comes from.

Jon as a mentor is not a cure for what afflicts Arya. Nothing good will come of putting Jon and Arya together, though they will become romantically involved.  Nothing good will come of it. Both of them are crazy bent on revenge. Jon died a traitor. He is not coming back a paragon of good virtues. He wasn’t that before he died. He is not capable of curing and leading Arya to sanity. 
 

Brienne is alright but she is not a doctor with access to modern medicine. Arya will have to be confined. It’s the only moral way to handle her. 

Edited November 29, 2022 by Darth Sidious

[TheLastWolf]

Yo guys, ol' Sheev's backuh

[Craving Peaches]

4 hours ago, Darth Sidious said:

Both of them are crazy bent on revenge.

Arya at a stretch, but no reading suggests Jon is 'crazy bent on revenge'. He goes to fight the Boltons after Ramsay threatens him and the whole Watch.

4 hours ago, Darth Sidious said:

though they will become romantically involved

Why? Because you want them to?

4 hours ago, Darth Sidious said:

Jon died a traitor.

Traitor to who? You? And before you mention it, no, Jon was not a traitor to the Watch or Westeros. He was trying to save the Watch and Westeros. Bowen Marsh is the traitor.

4 hours ago, Darth Sidious said:

He is not capable of curing and leading Arya to sanity. 

He doesn't need to lead Arya to sanity because she's not insane in the first place.

[Craving Peaches]

Arya cannot be both insane (in the proper legal/medical sense) and deserving of punishment. Notwithstanding that she's a child, if she is insane (which she isn't) then it isn't really her fault so she wouldn't be punished as it would be unjust. So you need to pick one. Either Arya is insane, in which case she's acquitted and receives no punishment, or she's not insane.

[Moiraine Sedai]

On 11/25/2022 at 7:46 PM, Craving Peaches said:

Aside from that the comment's also silly because Arya certainly would think twice about sending thousands of people to their deaths. She doesn't pray to kill everyone. She has a specific list of people she'd like to see dead because of the pain and suffering they inflicted upon her and her family. I don't understand why people ignore the text to try and paint Arya as some omnicidal maniac when she clearly isn't.

The number of Arya’s victims will exceed that list. There will be many collateral damages like the old insurance agent and Dareon. 

[Craving Peaches]

1 hour ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

The number of Arya’s victims will exceed that list. There will be many collateral damages like the old insurance agent and Dareon. 

Why? And they weren't collateral damage, they were specific targets.

[H Wadsworth Longfellow]

The possibility of getting cured is there but it is very unlikely given the seriousness of Arya's illness.  Sure she could do time in a prison but she is not going to get cured.  She got pleasure from killing Raff the sweetling.  Arya is becoming addicted to killing. 

[Craving Peaches]

1 hour ago, H Wadsworth Longfellow said:

She got pleasure from killing Raff the sweetling. 

And who wouldn't at least experience some sort of satisfaction, given how vile the man was even for the standards of their harsh and cruel world, if they heard he had died or killed him? That man was torturing innocents. He took pleasure in that. Surely it isn't hard to understand why Arya did it. Also, this hasn't been published yet.

[Lyanna<3Rhaegar]

On 11/30/2022 at 11:24 AM, Moiraine Sedai said:

The number of Arya’s victims will exceed that list. There will be many collateral damages like the old insurance agent and Dareon. 

This is pure speculation with no basis in the text. 

[Sandy Clegg]

On 11/27/2022 at 2:54 PM, Craving Peaches said:

I doubt the people of Westeros would think Arya is insane either. She is not prone to an excess of cruelty like 'Mad' Aerys, she isn't hallucinating, there are no signs she has become disconnected from reality, and so on.

Agreed. She's not insane, but it's clear that there are forces at work which may be gradually affecting her. She has warg powers (as we see with Nymeria and the cat) and as such is an extremely valuable asset which can be forged into a deadly weapon. She may not have revealed this to anyone, but that doesn't mean others haven't detected it. Braavos holds many secrets.

As for being disconnected - it's kind of subtle, but I feel as if Arya started disassociating with the appearance of the girl Weasel, who may or may not be actually real. You could read it as Arya 'leaving behind' the crying little girl aspect of herself in order to toughen up and survive. This may even mark the beginning of Arya becoming an unreliable narrator, inventing and colouring events (or even characters) during her POVs in order to avoid facing harsh truths. So even when Arya commits murders, her identity (not sanity) has been compromised and eroded to such an extent that can we really say 'Arya' is responsible?

The real crime here is the destruction of Arya's sense of self.

Also, can we all just agree that nobody here should be supporting mutilation as 'appropriate punishment' ... no matter what the historical era? This thread got a little weird.

Edited December 1, 2022 by Sandy Clegg

[Craving Peaches]

2 hours ago, Sandy Clegg said:

This may even mark the beginning of Arya becoming an unreliable narrator, inventing and colouring events (or even characters) during her POVs in order to avoid facing harsh truths. So even when Arya commits murders, her identity (not sanity) has been compromised and eroded to such an extent that can we really say 'Arya' is responsible?

I sort of agree, but I don't think Arya's personality changing is the same as her becoming disconnected from reality. If she began to properly dissociate, perhaps, but I don't think we've reached that stage yet. To me, as of now, it seems like all of Arya's other identities are still masks for the most part. Very effective ones, but deep down she is still Arya pretending to be something else, rather than just someone else. But I think the next book could change this for better or worse.

I too am quite disturbed by people's seeming desire to have such a Draconian punishment inflicted on a child.

Edited December 1, 2022 by Craving Peaches

[Sandy Clegg]

43 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

deep down she is still Arya pretending to be something else, rather than just someone else. But I think the next book could change this for better or worse.

This is true too. The fact that she retains the core of who she is will be the thing that saves her in the end, but I feel that even this will be put the test in the next books. Punishment is probably coming, but she won't go down easy.

[Ring3r]

Y'all are apparently not reading the same novels as I am.

[Bowen 747]

On 11/8/2022 at 6:28 PM, H Wadsworth Longfellow said:

Quinn Howard talks about Arya's dark future in this video from youtube.  Quinn was kinder to Arya than I would have been.  Please watch the video and we can discuss Arya's future. 

Arya's first murders were committed for the purpose of self-preservation.  Later murders cannot be excused nor forgiven.  The murders of Dareon and the Old Insurance man were two of the most heinous crimes committed in all of the story.  Arya, like Jon, is fickle about justice.  There was no justice for Dareon.  Dareon was a victim of injustice from the very beginning and was sent to the wall at the whim of his lord.  The supposed unethical business practices of the Old Man had not and has not been established.  Arya killed him because the crime is her key to get into the school of murderers.  Church is a better description for the House of Black & White.  Cult is much better.  A cult of crackpots and evildoers who sacrifice people to the god of many faces. 

Catelyn is now Stoneheart.  A walking zombie without mercy or pity.  Jon will come back as the Coldheart, another zombie who will show no pity and no mercy to those who will stand between he and Arya.  Arya is Darkheart, which is a subtle difference.  Darkheart is worse.  Arya will show no mercy but dark also means evil.  Arya is insane to be sure.  But being insane does not mean she is without guilt. 

The Ghost of High Heart associates the tragic past of Summerhall to present day Arya Stark.  Wildfire was involved at Summerhall.  The woman saw an accurate vision of Arya's dark future.  Arya has a lot of blood on her hands.  She will soon be covered in many layers of blood.  Arya will commit a mass murder which will result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent people.  I have seen posted predictions of her methodology of choice.  I do not think Arya will employ poison.  She is too small to attack a crowd directly.  Arya will use Wildfire to commit mass murder.  It is impossible for Arya to ever be normal again.  The future for her is very, very dark.  And she will become the darkest, most evil, of the main characters. 

 

No way Arya becomes mentally healthy again.  I hope she doesn't blow up King's Landing or any city.  This is George R R Martin though and that kind of drama cannot be ruled out.  Arya is the most probable of the antagonists to commit a crime of that magnitude. 

[TheLastWolf]

26 minutes ago, Bowen 747 said:

This is George R R Martin though and that kind of drama cannot be ruled out. 

Is this enough for a ban mods? Blasphemy , not just the boring old irrational hatred

It wouldn't matter anyway, alts after all

[Craving Peaches]

2 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

Arya is the most probable of the antagonists to commit a crime of that magnitude. 

The Book Itself strongly suggests otherwise.

[Sandy Clegg]

3 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

No way Arya becomes mentally healthy again.  I hope she doesn't blow up King's Landing or any city.  This is George R R Martin though and that kind of drama cannot be ruled out.  Arya is the most probable of the antagonists to commit a crime of that magnitude. 

Define 'crime'. We have no idea of the context in which any such event will occur, because we don't actually know what's happening in the world of ASOIAF. We only have imperfect, often unreliable, POVs. So much of the history, timeline, and even the geography, makes no sense. If Dany is the 'slayer of lies' - what huge 'lie' exists that needs to be slain? We have no idea, but it'll probably be on a bigger scale than just 'Oh, Aegon isn't actually my nephew'.

So many of these 'morality judgement' posts fail to see any kind of big picture twist or reveal coming. Maybe King's Landing will need to be burnt down? Maybe it gets completely taken over by shape-changing pod people. Or squishers.   

If Neo destroys the Matrix, 'killing' millions of virtual existences so they can waken in the real one, does that make him a mass murderer or a hero? Not saying Westeros is a matrix, just that context matters. And we don't really have the complete picture yet, not by a long shot. There are many, many ways that GRRM could have things play out, because these books are, like it or not, fantasy.

[SeanF]

On 12/1/2022 at 4:49 AM, H Wadsworth Longfellow said:

The possibility of getting cured is there but it is very unlikely given the seriousness of Arya's illness.  Sure she could do time in a prison but she is not going to get cured.  She got pleasure from killing Raff the sweetling.  Arya is becoming addicted to killing. 

Who wouldn’t get pleasure from killing a murdering, raping, paedophile?

[Roswell]

Jaquen got caught in King's Landing while looking for the cache of wildfire.  He was imprisoned before he could share the knowledge.  But what if he later shares that knowledge with his student, Arya Stark.  Arya would know where the jars are stored and she can very easily burn down the city.  Arya is angry enough to kill that many people.