The Song of Ice and Fire: Daenerys & The Others

[Lady Stonehearts Simp]

I think most of us have heard GRRM say that the title of the series refers to The Others as the Ice, and Daenerys and her dragons as the Fire, in the Song. A tiktoker I follow, Kevin Pendragon, raised an interesting idea that I hadn’t thought about.

The whole issue with the others is that they are a true existential threat, that Westeros ignores, due to their obsession with the game of thrones. It’s a threat they’ll have to deal with by the end of the series. 
 

But what if the Daenerys is a threat as well? I’m not talking in a “Mad Queen” type of way or that Daenerys is evil. But think about it. Westeros has largely ignored Daenerys for the whole story. A few brief mentions of her, sure, but they largely ignore her. And view her dragons as tales from the edge of their world. Daenerys is an idealist of the highest order, but she was also raised by Viserys to feel entitled to Westeros’ throne. What if she comes to Westeros, helps deal with the Others, but, to quote the abomination, wants to “break the wheel” of Westeros, as well? 
 

Ice is the Others, the death. Fire is Valyria, Dragons, Life. Ice grew too powerful after the dragons death, but once the war is won, and Ice is defeated, will fire rage out of control? As in the days of Valyria. Is it possible Daenerys tries to bring revolution to Westeros, and is rejected? Could she become a threat to Westeros?

The Song is about the magic forces in the world, the threats that are facing the world. Could Daenerys be the final threat to Westeros?

[StarkTullies]

3 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

I think most of us have heard GRRM say that the title of the series refers to The Others as the Ice, and Daenerys and her dragons as the Fire, in the Song.

This is always what I've thought, but I never read GRRM saying that.  Do you know when he did?  It seems most people (on this forum, at least) think it is Starks and Targaryens, or Jon and Dany, or "the prince that was promised whose song is the song of ice and fire".  But the two threats (ice and fire) coming to Westeros always seemed like the obvious explanation to me.

I think the dragonriders and the dragons are just a big of a threat to Westeros as the Others and their wights.  I also don't think that the Others are true one-dimensional villains.  Villains to humanity for sure, but so is Tywin Lannister and his Bloody Mummers.  Besides the fact that GRRM repeatedly says he doesn't want the enemy to be Sauron and Orcs but multi-dimensional villains, in the very first chapter we see the Others speaking and laughing.  Villains can certainly talk and laugh, but this proves that the Others are more than just mindless monsters.  If their goal is to simply wipe out all of humanity, they are certainly taking their time.  The Others directly attacked the Rangers at the Fist, going after them directly while their attacks against Free Folk have been slow and intermittent so far.  Craster is spared (not for good reasons certainly), but this shows they are capable of negotiations.

Likewise, I don't think the dragons themselves are evil, but they are generally used as instruments of evil.  GRRM has called them metaphors for WMDs, and George isn't writing a story about how nukes will save the world.  Most of the "good" that the Targaryens accomplished with the dragons is the threat that they represented, but when they actually used the dragons it was almost always evil.  Aegon I is a tyrannical ultra-villain who committed genocide in Dorne just because he could, and no story rewrites about prophecies will ever change my mind.  Dany bringing dragons back to the world was not a good deed.

The three dragonriders won't be a united front.  (If not more than three: I think Sheepsteeler or her descendants may still live in the Mountains of the Vale... but I also think that new dragons appearing in the next couple books would seem out of left field and I prefer that doesn't happen.)  Jon will almost definitely be one dragon rider, but whoever is the third won't be on Dany's side (and Jon won't necessarily be either).  It could be Victarion, or Euron, or even Tyrion (George Martin's "the villain"), and none of them ending up with a dragon will be a good thing.

I don't think dragon riders are necessarily bad, just like I don't think the Others are necessarily (all) bad, since George Martin is not writing a story about an exclusively evil race.  But they all pose a threat to Westeros.

3 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

Ice is the Others, the death. Fire is Valyria, Dragons, Life.

I disagree about fire representing life.  Here's a quote from Maester Aemon, from the House of Fire: "I should not have left the Wall. Lord Snow could not have known, but I should have seen it. Fire consumes, but cold preserves."  Here is a quote from Beric Dondarrion, worshipper of the "fire god": "Fire consumes.  It consumes, and when it is done there is nothing left. Nothing."  I think the only person who talked about fire being "life" is Melisandre, who is famously wrong about everything.

3 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

Is it possible Daenerys tries to bring revolution to Westeros, and is rejected? Could she become a threat to Westeros?

Yes, and yes.

3 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

The Song is about the magic forces in the world, the threats that are facing the world. Could Daenerys be the final threat to Westeros?

I doubt it.  A threat, but I don't think there will be any one final "ultimate villain".  I think the threat of the Others, dragons, and non-supernatural political warfare will all happen simultaneously.  A very difficult feat to pull this all off (storywise), which I am sympathetic toward GRRM for taking so long to write these books.

[Lady Stonehearts Simp]

5 hours ago, StarkTullies said:

This is always what I've thought, but I never read GRRM saying that.  Do you know when he did?  It seems most people (on this forum, at least) think it is Starks and Targaryens, or Jon and Dany, or "the prince that was promised whose song is the song of ice and fire".  But the two threats (ice and fire) coming to Westeros always seemed like the obvious explanation to me.

I think the dragonriders and the dragons are just a big of a threat to Westeros as the Others and their wights.  I also don't think that the Others are true one-dimensional villains.  Villains to humanity for sure, but so is Tywin Lannister and his Bloody Mummers.  Besides the fact that GRRM repeatedly says he doesn't want the enemy to be Sauron and Orcs but multi-dimensional villains, in the very first chapter we see the Others speaking and laughing.  Villains can certainly talk and laugh, but this proves that the Others are more than just mindless monsters.  If their goal is to simply wipe out all of humanity, they are certainly taking their time.  The Others directly attacked the Rangers at the Fist, going after them directly while their attacks against Free Folk have been slow and intermittent so far.  Craster is spared (not for good reasons certainly), but this shows they are capable of negotiations.

Likewise, I don't think the dragons themselves are evil, but they are generally used as instruments of evil.  GRRM has called them metaphors for WMDs, and George isn't writing a story about how nukes will save the world.  Most of the "good" that the Targaryens accomplished with the dragons is the threat that they represented, but when they actually used the dragons it was almost always evil.  Aegon I is a tyrannical ultra-villain who committed genocide in Dorne just because he could, and no story rewrites about prophecies will ever change my mind.  Dany bringing dragons back to the world was not a good deed.

The three dragonriders won't be a united front.  (If not more than three: I think Sheepsteeler or her descendants may still live in the Mountains of the Vale... but I also think that new dragons appearing in the next couple books would seem out of left field and I prefer that doesn't happen.)  Jon will almost definitely be one dragon rider, but whoever is the third won't be on Dany's side (and Jon won't necessarily be either).  It could be Victarion, or Euron, or even Tyrion (George Martin's "the villain"), and none of them ending up with a dragon will be a good thing.

I don't think dragon riders are necessarily bad, just like I don't think the Others are necessarily (all) bad, since George Martin is not writing a story about an exclusively evil race.  But they all pose a threat to Westeros.

I disagree about fire representing life.  Here's a quote from Maester Aemon, from the House of Fire: "I should not have left the Wall. Lord Snow could not have known, but I should have seen it. Fire consumes, but cold preserves."  Here is a quote from Beric Dondarrion, worshipper of the "fire god": "Fire consumes.  It consumes, and when it is done there is nothing left. Nothing."  I think the only person who talked about fire being "life" is Melisandre, who is famously wrong about everything.

Yes, and yes.

I doubt it.  A threat, but I don't think there will be any one final "ultimate villain".  I think the threat of the Others, dragons, and non-supernatural political warfare will all happen simultaneously.  A very difficult feat to pull this all off (storywise), which I am sympathetic toward GRRM for taking so long to write these books.

When I say final threat I don’t mean her as the ultimate antagonist. Just that at the series end, she is the last problem they have to deal l with.

[Springwatch]

12 hours ago, StarkTullies said:

I disagree about fire representing life.  Here's a quote from Maester Aemon, from the House of Fire: "I should not have left the Wall. Lord Snow could not have known, but I should have seen it. Fire consumes, but cold preserves."  Here is a quote from Beric Dondarrion, worshipper of the "fire god": "Fire consumes.  It consumes, and when it is done there is nothing left. Nothing."  I think the only person who talked about fire being "life" is Melisandre, who is famously wrong about everything.

I think you're wrong - the fire is the life inside, and you have to eat, to consume, to carry on living.

I'm struggling to remember counter-examples, but there's one good one - by the end, the red priests are promising eternal life to the followers of Daenerys.

ETA

The point about Melisandre isn't that she's always wrong. The visions are right, but in unpredictable ways. Want to have a go at interpreting this one?

[...] dead things shambled silent through the cold, beneath a great grey cliff where fires burned inside a hundred caves. Then the wind rose and the white mist came sweeping in, impossibly cold, and one by one the fires went out. Afterward only the skulls remained.

Edited June 1, 2023 by Springwatch

[SeanF]

Martin said of Fire and Ice, that Ice represents hatred, revenge, and cold inhumanity. Fire is warmth, passion, and sexual ardour.

Fire is good, but has the potential to be bad.  Ice is always bad.

Dragons may be weapons of mass destruction, but WMD often settle wars quickly.  They also act as a deterrent.

The bloodiest, most terrible, wars, have been fought with edged and pointed weapons, or guns.  The An Lushan revolt, the Mongol Conquests, The Thirty Years War, The Deluge, involved carnage that dwarfs modern warfare.  The Khmer Rouge, the Interahamwe, the einsatzgruppen killed their victims intimately.

We see that in universe.  TWOT5K is horrific.  It does not involve the use of WMD.  Banish the notion that warfare was more “civilised” when men clashed swords.

I’m sure the Others, like Tad Williams’ Norns, have reason to hate humanity. That doesn’t alter that they pose a threat that surpasses even the worst human leaders.

[Moiraine Sedai]

17 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

I think most of us have heard GRRM say that the title of the series refers to The Others as the Ice, and Daenerys and her dragons as the Fire, in the Song. A tiktoker I follow, Kevin Pendragon, raised an interesting idea that I hadn’t thought about.

The whole issue with the others is that they are a true existential threat, that Westeros ignores, due to their obsession with the game of thrones. It’s a threat they’ll have to deal with by the end of the series. 
 

But what if the Daenerys is a threat as well? I’m not talking in a “Mad Queen” type of way or that Daenerys is evil. But think about it. Westeros has largely ignored Daenerys for the whole story. A few brief mentions of her, sure, but they largely ignore her. And view her dragons as tales from the edge of their world. Daenerys is an idealist of the highest order, but she was also raised by Viserys to feel entitled to Westeros’ throne. What if she comes to Westeros, helps deal with the Others, but, to quote the abomination, wants to “break the wheel” of Westeros, as well? 
 

Ice is the Others, the death. Fire is Valyria, Dragons, Life. Ice grew too powerful after the dragons death, but once the war is won, and Ice is defeated, will fire rage out of control? As in the days of Valyria. Is it possible Daenerys tries to bring revolution to Westeros, and is rejected? Could she become a threat to Westeros?

The Song is about the magic forces in the world, the threats that are facing the world. Could Daenerys be the final threat to Westeros?

Jon, Arya, and Bran are the threats to Westeros. Angry Arya, especially, will be murdering cities. 

[kissdbyfire]

The real threat is the absence of balance; both ice and fire/winter and summer are necessary but there must be balance. The actual threat to life on Planetos may very well be the screwed up seasons. 

[SeanF]

If fire is good, but has the potential to go bad, then Daenerys may be the kind of liberationist leader who achieves great things, before going too far, like the leaders of the French Revolution.

However, Ice is evil, ab initio.

[Craving Peaches]

38 minutes ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

Angry Arya, especially, will be murdering cities.

Where is the evidence for this?

Reminder that Arya is not the one who is going to unleash massive flying, fire breathing lizards...

[TheBlackSwan]

14 hours ago, StarkTullies said:

This is always what I've thought, but I never read GRRM saying that.  Do you know when he did? 

George R.R. Martin - Talk To Al Jazeera

18 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

The Song is about the magic forces in the world, the threats that are facing the world. Could Daenerys be the final threat to Westeros?

I think so.
The Others are said to be threaten the world with a never ending winter but if Daenerys is victorious, R'hllorists claims she would bring a never ending summer? I think the Others and the Dragonlords are connected to the magic of ice and fire and those magical forces are connected to the seasons. The title is also a reference to Frost's poem in which ice and fire, although opposing forces, they can destroy the world.
So if the Others wins, if ice magic take over, an ice age that would end the world, if the Dragonlords remains, fire magic will cause an never ending scorching heatwave. Get rid of them, the seasons will back to normal.

[Lady Stonehearts Simp]

1 hour ago, kissdbyfire said:

The real threat is the absence of balance; both ice and fire/winter and summer are necessary but there must be balance. The actual threat to life on Planetos may very well be the screwed up seasons. 

And I think if Ice is obliterated, then Fire will need to dealt with in kind for the world to survive

[Lady Stonehearts Simp]

1 hour ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

Jon, Arya, and Bran are the threats to Westeros. Angry Arya, especially, will be murdering cities. 

I’m asking politely. Please keep this nonsense confined to you and your friend’s topics. Please don’t derail this thread with this nonsense.

[kissdbyfire]

6 minutes ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

And I think if Ice is obliterated, then Fire will need to dealt with in kind for the world to survive

Well, as I’ve said, I think both are necessary. So if one is obliterated the remaining element will overpower everything, so that’s not how balance can be achieved. IMO.

[SeanF]

WRT the dragons, it is worth noting that to the Ghiscari elite, they are symbols of dread and fear, but to the slaves and freedmen, they are symbols of liberation.  The freedmen detest the "hero" who tried to kill Drogon.

 

[Craving Peaches]

31 minutes ago, SeanF said:

The freedmen detest the "hero" who tried to kill Drogon.

Where does it say this again? I don't have the books on hand at the moment.

[SeanF]

31 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

Where does it say this again? I don't have the books on hand at the moment.

I'll have to check, but it comes up when Barristan is musing that that freeborn Meereenese consider the failed dragon-slayer a hero, whereas the freedmen hate him.  Also, the representatives of the freedmen react very badly to suggestions that the dragons be slain.

[Lilac & Gooseberries]

Fire consumes, but cold preserves. 

As I have told way too many times before both fire or ice are the villains. Without ice fire will burn everything and without fire ice will freeze everything. It's the balance between fire and ice that will bring the serenity. Both the Others with the Great Other and the dragons with Rhllor need to be exterminated in order for the humanity to survive.

[Lady Stonehearts Simp]

45 minutes ago, Lilac & Gooseberries said:

Fire consumes, but cold preserves. 

As I have told way too many times before both fire or ice are the villains. Without ice fire will burn everything and without fire ice will freeze everything. It's the balance between fire and ice that will bring the serenity. Both the Others with the Great Other and the dragons with Rhllor need to be exterminated in order for the humanity to survive.

Do you think Daenerys will go full villain? Or do you think it’ll be more complicated than that?

[SeanF]

2 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

Do you think Daenerys will go full villain? Or do you think it’ll be more complicated than that?

Do you think that “revenge, hatred, cold inhumanity”, and “warmth, passion, sexual ardour” (the author’s own words) are equally bad things?

I do not.

[Lilac & Gooseberries]

3 hours ago, Lady Stonehearts Simp said:

Do you think Daenerys will go full villain? Or do you think it’ll be more complicated than that?

No. Definitely no. For all her faults Dany isn't an evil character and deep down she wants to help. However good intentions don't always have a good result. The havoc she caused in SB is the good example for this.

Edited June 3, 2023 by Lilac & Gooseberries