What is compelling about having Daenerys be someone other than the daughter of Aerys and Rhaella?

[Hippocras]

4 minutes ago, Sandy Clegg said:

Isn't there a theory that the maesters had been subtly messing with the Targ bloodline since the first Aegon, ensuring that his descendants 300 years later have so little Targ blood left that they are functionally unable to do whatever they need to do to breed dragons, via their 'blood bond'? 

That version of events would make it very much pertinent if Dany wasn't a real Targ, as it means that whatever version of Aegon's bloodline survives is now in a 'bastard tributary' way off the official bloodline. To which Dany must logically somehow belong. Because Dany's story surely goes hand in hand with the fact that the line of Targ dragons  had withered and died away by the time of AGOT. Whatever the Targs had in them 300 years ago to breed dragons - it was lost over the centuries. By natural means or foul. They lost their mojo.

Not saying I believe the Dany origin alternatives presented here either, but saying her alternative origin means 'nothing' is a bit of an overstatement, when Dany's non-Targ origins plus her ability to breed dragons goes a long, long way to explaining one of the central mysteries of GRRM's universe - why the dragons died out, and why she was able to bring them back.

And if indeed it turns out that there is an alternative bloodline that can breed dragons - then surely this would start a massive goldrush for anyone out there who actually was related to Dany. Which Illyrio, for example, might have knowledge of.

So the ability to breed dragons wouldn't just transfer to 'anybody who wants to'. Instead, the story would shift on its axis - to tracking down whoever really does remain of Aegon's bloodline. And that, to me, sounds like one hell of a story avenue to pursue. Regardless, it doesn't take away from Dany's story. She was able to do what no-one else had done for over a century. Her bloodline has what it takes. It just might have been mis-labelled. So ... why argue about the label, when it's the fire and blood within which drive the story?

Well, I think there is something here.....but also not.... ;D

 

I think there HAVE been numerous attempts to prevent the Prince that was Promised prophesy from ever being realized, and that Mirri Maz Duur was just the latest example of a long chain of attempts to interfere with Targaryen reproduction.

But I also think that it is not so much that Targaryens are no longer relevant, but simply that they lost sight of the importance of the female line in their efforts to remain in power in the face of Westerosi patriarchy. So it is not the Targaryen NAME that matters, but the Targaryen blood very much does. And the female bloodlines take twisty distorted turns through a very large collection of families, and tracking them is exceedingly difficult.  Meanwhile the occasional bastard here and there also throws things for a loop, as do a handful of royals who are not who they are believed to be.
 

This is why I have been trying so hard to get people to discuss other families, and to try to make educated guesses on where characters such as Rhea, sister of Aegon V, or Laena, daughter of Baela and Alyn ended up. Which families they ended up in is extremely relevant IMO.

[Sandy Clegg]

23 minutes ago, Hippocras said:

This is why I have been trying so hard to get people to discuss other families, and to try to make educated guesses on where characters such as Rhea, sister of Aegon V, or Laena, daughter of Baela and Alyn ended up. Which families they ended up in is extremely relevant IMO.

I mean, this is all up to George really. Personally I wonder whether he might go down the route similar to that of dragonseeds. Having another 'big family' discover that they have inherited the Targ bloodline all along would just make them the new de facto Targaryens. George is an old hippy, so it kind of makes sense that he might want to see what would happen if the dragon breeding powers came to lie in the hands of the less privileged. But again, this is a whole new canvas George gets to paint on and I don't think we can easily predict where the 'dragon chips' will fall if Dany's origins turn out to be non-canon.

[Hippocras]

1 hour ago, Sandy Clegg said:

I mean, this is all up to George really. Personally I wonder whether he might go down the route similar to that of dragonseeds. Having another 'big family' discover that they have inherited the Targ bloodline all along would just make them the new de facto Targaryens. George is an old hippy, so it kind of makes sense that he might want to see what would happen if the dragon breeding powers came to lie in the hands of the less privileged. But again, this is a whole new canvas George gets to paint on and I don't think we can easily predict where the 'dragon chips' will fall if Dany's origins turn out to be non-canon.

Well I don't think it is really that. If you follow the female line, then it hops from one "House" to another, and yes, including less prestigious families. It is not just about transferring to another family, because females and bastards are specifically exempt from being tied to "Houses" in that way.

Edited July 6, 2023 by Hippocras

[Sandy Clegg]

1 minute ago, Hippocras said:

Well I don't think it is really that. If you follow the female line, then it hops from one "House" to another. It is not just about transferring to another family, because females and bastards are specifically exempt from being tied to "Houses" in that way.

I mean, if it's traceable then sure. That would be a good thread to chase down. It all sounds a bit too much like hard work for me to do personally, but I'll happily read the findings. George does so much work with family trees and they're so detailed, so plenty of scope for unlikely twists and turns.   

 

[Hippocras]

35 minutes ago, Sandy Clegg said:

I mean, if it's traceable then sure. That would be a good thread to chase down. It all sounds a bit too much like hard work for me to do personally, but I'll happily read the findings. George does so much work with family trees and they're so detailed, so plenty of scope for unlikely twists and turns.   

 

That's the tricky part. It is not in fact traceable just yet. But I do not think that means GRRM does not intend to eventually clarify. I think he sets the table, but leaves a lot of details to figure out later. So he may well know that he has plans for the female line without having it all plotted out until the right moment.

[Gilbert Green]

14 hours ago, Hippocras said:

For someone who on another thread was determined to believe only the most basic, straightforward explanation, your ideas here are pretty far out there.

I never said that elaborate theories were bad.  If you thought I said that, you misunderstood.  Complex theories are merely LESS LIKELY to be true when a simpler theory explains the exact same evidence AS WELL OR BETTER.

We never got to discussing the evidence.  You simply dismissed the theory because you did not like it.  Which is fine. 

I don't recall you presenting a better, neater, simpler theory, explaining the same clues and loose ends,  Where was your neater simpler solution that pulls together such dangling riddles as "three mounts must you ride"?  And/or the lemon-tree climate discrepancies?  And/or the future revelations at the House with the Red Door?  And/or the point behind the Young Griff subplot?  And/or the story relevance of Frog Martell?  And/or the identity of Septa Lemore?  And/or the Blackfyre connection?

When you ignore the evidence, because you find it all too confusing or whatever, that may be a simple solution.  But Ocham's razor is not relevant to such simple solutions.

14 hours ago, Hippocras said:

IMO, Dany being a slave girl and blood magic being rooted in....nothing at all makes zero sense.

My theory is that Dany is the daughter of Rhaegar.  And was sold into slavery after her caretaker at the House with the Red Door died.  The servants stole her and sold her, along with everything else.

Dany is a slave girl no matter who she is.  Illyrio sold her to Drogo.  Jorah tells this to Dany outright.

 

 

Edited July 7, 2023 by Gilbert Green

[Hippocras]

10 hours ago, Gilbert Green said:

We never got to discussing the evidence.  You simply dismissed the theory because you did not like it.  Which is fine. 

....

When you ignore the evidence, because you find it all too confusing or whatever, that may be a simple solution.  But Ocham's razor is not relevant to such simple solutions.

It is not that I ignore the evidence. It is that what you call evidence is extremely flimsy, highly subjective, and these are very far-out conclusions to base on so little.

I still really don't get why you need Dany to be the daughter of Rhaegar. You are doing a contortion act to make it work, but there are just too many obstacles to getting Dany in the right place to play out her story. It is, frankly, you who is ignoring evidence, by refusing to acknowledge how ridiculous it is that Viserys would ever go along with such a series of events. If Dany was ever swapped, it was right at birth, before Viserys ever got to know her. He was simply too stupid and too Targ-supremacist to ever knowingly go along with a hidden identity.

Just because Rhaegar thought all 3 heads of the dragon had to descend from him does not mean it was true. That was simply what he believed. If he did not consider Viserys I don't blame him. It would have been plain from childhood that Viserys was no leader or "dragon".

By far the best explanation for Dany is that she is who she thinks she is, and the reason it is the best explanation is not just because of the complicated logistics surrounding any other version of her identity. It is deeper than that. According to the official story, most likely true in this case, Dany was conceived on the night that Brandon and Rickard Stark were murdered. First the Father, then the heir. It fits the pattern of magical sacrifice and it therefore makes absolute sense that a child conceived on such a night, when the heirs of "Ice" were killed (by fire), would later become the mother of dragons.

 

Edited July 7, 2023 by Hippocras

[Mourning Star]

12 hours ago, Gilbert Green said:

I never said that elaborate theories were bad.  If you thought I said that, you misunderstood.  Complex theories are merely LESS LIKELY to be true when a simpler theory explains the exact same evidence AS WELL OR BETTER.

When you ignore the evidence, because you find it all too confusing or whatever, that may be a simple solution.  But Ocham's razor is not relevant to such simple solutions.

FWIW Occam’s razor doesn’t apply to fiction at all, especially not fantasy.

[Gilbert Green]

18 minutes ago, Mourning Star said:

FWIW Occam’s razor doesn’t apply to fiction at all, especially not fantasy.

Depends on the context.  Anyhow, I did not originally cite Occham's Razor, at least not by name.  I merely took the humble position that "Maegor can't have kids" is both simpler and more likely than "Maegor can have kids, but his first wife was infertile, and then Tyanna of the Tower cursed his wives with blood magic, and then chose for some reason to not have any kids with him herself".

Hypocras thinks that because I took that position then, I am somehow contradicting myself now, and I just don't think that is true.

Perhaps the simple solution to this would be not to import disputes from other threads. 

[Gilbert Green]

7 hours ago, Hippocras said:

It is not that I ignore the evidence. It is that what you call evidence is extremely flimsy, highly subjective, and these are very far-out conclusions to base on so little.

This is not discussing my evidence.  This is merely calling my evidence names.

I don't recall raking you over the coals when you guessed that the 3 heads of the dragon were Jon, his aunt Dany and his brother Young Griff (Aegon).  I merely presented my own guess that the 3 heads were Jon, his sister Dany, and his brother  Frog (Aegon).

Both of us are only guessing.   But I have my reasons. 

7 hours ago, Hippocras said:

I still really don't get why you need Dany to be the daughter of Rhaegar.

And I don't see the need to engage in ad hominem attacks.  And yes, attacking someone's motives is an ad hominem attack

I don't "need" Dany to be anything.  I just followed what look like clues to me. 

Here's just one example of a vague clue I follow.  One of the many ways my theory better fits the textual evidence is that my theory explains the "child of three" reference, as Dany is one of 3 children of a specific person.   The text treats this clue as significant, and I see no other way that Dany can meaningfully be a "child of three" as distinct from merely being a "random person of three random persons, who, like all random persons, were once children".  I have also followed those clues that suggest that Rhaegar - who seems to know something about this mysterious prophesy - thinks that the three heads of the dragon will be his 3 children.

Yes, these are still only guesses based on VAGUE clues.  But can you really not have enough respect for other people to acknowledge that the reasons actually give actually ARE their real reasons?

I did not attack you personally for guessing that Young Griff was the real Aegon.  But are there no clues that might plausibly suggest to me that Young Griff is NOT the real Aegon, and might instead be a Blackfyre pretender?

7 hours ago, Hippocras said:

It is, frankly, you who is ignoring evidence, by refusing to acknowledge how ridiculous it is that Viserys would ever go along with such a series of events. If Dany was ever swapped, it was right at birth, before Viserys ever got to know her. He was simply too stupid and too Targ-supremacist to ever knowingly go along with a hidden identity.

Again, this is not discussion.  You are just raging at me for refusing to agree with your arguments.  I'm sorry, but I find these points completely unconvincing.

Viserys was arguably too Targ Supremacist to do what he apparently did, which was to marry his sister to a barbarian.  Maybe this is a subtle clue to my theory.  Or maybe not.  But at the very least, it is a clue that you cannot make grand generalizations about what people will and will not do. 

7 hours ago, Hippocras said:

Just because Rhaegar thought all 3 heads of the dragon had to descend from him does not mean it was true. That was simply what he believed. If he did not consider Viserys I don't blame him. It would have been plain from childhood that Viserys was no leader or "dragon".

Subtle clues are always deniable.  There is always a way around them.  All of us are just guessing.  And sure.  Prophesies don't necessarily mean anything.  They are merely what people believe.  My own literary sense is that these look more like clues than red herrings.  But of course, you will respond by howling THAT'S SUBJECTIVE, and you're right.  Fine.  Let's agree to disagree.

Repeat after me.

IT IS ONLY A THEORY.  IT IS ONLY A THEORY.  IT IS ONLY A THEORY.  IT IS ONLY A THEORY.

But I don't think it HURTS the theory that to dismiss the theory you have to dismiss the textual evidence, and argue that subtle textual evidence does not really mean anything.  I'm not saying you are necessarily wrong, just that my theory is obviously not based on nothing.

My humble hypothesis is merely that GRRM planted these clues for a reason and that they might actually mean something.

Now I more or less subscribe to R+L=J (albeit a non-standard variant).  But maybe, by your standards, Jon really is the child of Ned and Wylla.  It's what the text directly tells us, and I've never seen any iron-clad proof to the contrary.  There is absolutely nothing you can throw at me that would not be deniable.  R+L=J could not survive the standards you hold for theories you don't like.

Edited July 7, 2023 by Gilbert Green

[Hippocras]

Look, I am not angry with you, or scolding you, or calling your evidence names, I am just saying I doubt your theory and giving my reasons. 

[Gilbert Green]

10 hours ago, Hippocras said:

Look, I am not angry with you, or scolding you, or calling your evidence names, I am just saying I doubt your theory and giving my reasons. 

That's fine.  Let's agree to disagree.  I have no desire to convince you.

I did not start this thread though.  You did, and I'm a bit confused why.  I don't get the feeling that you have any interest in my actual reasons for believing or suspecting this that or the other thing.  Just as I am not interested in discussing my perverse motives for entertaining heretical thoughts.

Which leaves us at a standstill, I think.

[Hippocras]

4 hours ago, Gilbert Green said:

That's fine.  Let's agree to disagree.  I have no desire to convince you.

I did not start this thread though.  You did, and I'm a bit confused why.  I don't get the feeling that you have any interest in my actual reasons for believing or suspecting this that or the other thing.  Just as I am not interested in discussing my perverse motives for entertaining heretical thoughts.

Which leaves us at a standstill, I think.

Nope, I didn't start this one either.

My main points on this thread have been that

1. Dany is probably who she thinks she is but

2. It is moderately compelling to consider she may be a bastard (of Aerys) because it would settle the issue of Ashara while also providing a perfect inversion of Jon's story. As in the one who grew up a bastard is legit, while the one with an entitlement complex who thought she was legit is a bastard. There is some poetry in that, if not the version I consider the most likely.

Edited July 8, 2023 by Hippocras

[Gilbert Green]

7 hours ago, Hippocras said:

Nope, I didn't start this one either.

Ah, fair enough.  My mistake.  Apologies.

For some reason I got the impression that, of these two "what's wrong with those people" threads, @Craving Peaches started one, and you started the other.  Actually, Peaches started them both.

I'm going to address your point about Viserys being too stupid, only because you accused me of ignoring it.  I just don't think it is so compelling a point that I should be required to agree with it under pain of accusations of bad faith.  Viserys was stinking drunk when he got himself killed.  And Dany being treated with more honor than himself was a humiliation he had never before endured, one that stung him deeper into drink and madness.   Other than the drink-fueled events that led to his death, I don't think you can point to much else that demonstrates that abysmal stupidity is his normal state.  It is not that I disagree that Viserys is relatively stupid, I just don't see him as being so abysmally stupid that he is incapable of carrying out a relatively simple scheme thought up by someone else.  Which was my humble hypothesis.  If you think he's necessarily too stupid, that's fine, but I respectfully disagree.

7 hours ago, Hippocras said:

My main points on this thread have been that

1. Dany is probably who she thinks she is but

2. It is moderately compelling to consider she may be a bastard (of Aerys) because it would settle the issue of Ashara while also providing a perfect inversion of Jon's story. As in the one who grew up a bastard is legit, while the one with an entitlement complex who thought she was legit is a bastard. There is some poetry in that, if not the version I consider the most likely.

As far as I can think, neither of these hypotheses can be ruled out.  I can maybe come up with a couple of objections to #2, but they are not airtight. 

I'm not sure I understand why Aerys + Ashara = Dany would be more compelling than Rhaegar + Ashara = Dany.  She would be a bastard either way.  And surely there are more clues (admittedly not many) pointing to Ashara + Rhaegar than to Ashara + Aerys.   My own suspicion is that legitimatcy will not be much of an issue because Aegon (the real one, whoever he is) will take the throne.

 

 

[Craving Peaches]

6 minutes ago, Gilbert Green said:

For some reason I got the impression that, of these two "what's wrong with those people"

None of my threads were asking "what's wrong with these people" ...

I started one thread saying I was not convinced by Lemongate and asking what others found convincing about it, and another thread asking what people thought would be narratively compelling about Daenerys not being the daughter of Aerys and Rhaella. Both were attempts to see what others thought and try to broaden my views, not to criticise. I don't think there is anything 'wrong' with anyone for believing in any theory, regardless of whether I believe in it myself.

[Gilbert Green]

17 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

None of my threads were asking "what's wrong with these people" ...

I started one thread saying I was not convinced by Lemongate and asking what others found convincing about it, and another thread asking what people thought would be narratively compelling about Daenerys not being the daughter of Aerys and Rhaella. Both were attempts to see what others thought and try to broaden my views, not to criticise. I don't think there is anything 'wrong' with anyone for believing in any theory, regardless of whether I believe in it myself.

This is a perfectly fair characterization of your original posts.  Viewed in isolation.  But then you consistently hit "like" on a certain type of response, and did not seem otherwise interested in brainstorming or exploration.  So I drew my own conclusions as to what sort of response you were really looking for.  Sorry if I concluded wrongly, but I did notice a pattern.  Not that it matters.  Start what threads you want.  Like what posts you want.

Edited July 8, 2023 by Gilbert Green

[Hippocras]

14 minutes ago, Gilbert Green said:

I'm not sure I understand why Aerys + Ashara = Dany would be more compelling than Rhaegar + Ashara = Dany.  She would be a bastard either way.  And surely there are more clues (admittedly not many) pointing to Ashara + Rhaegar than to Ashara + Aerys.   My own suspicion is that legitimatcy will not be much of an issue because Aegon (the real one, whoever he is) will take the throne.

I think Aerys is more likely for several reasons.

1. Rhaegar, at the time when he started looking for a new mother for a third child (because Elia's life would be in danger if she had more) he already had two. He only needed ONE more child with one mother, and he clearly chose Lyanna Stark.

2. Aerys caused some unspecified kind of trouble by showing up at Harrenhal unexpectedly, and Ashara was also "dishonoured" at Harrenhal. Aerys had a long and storied history of taking his liberties with women, whether they wanted it or not (he was the King - see Tywin's wedding) and he also had a history of taking a great deal of pleasure in shaming, undermining, and causing distress to people he believed had slighted him (see his actions against Tywin at same tournament). It therefore follows that he would have taken the same kind of perverse pleasure in "dishonouring" someone he felt had been scheming against him (Ashara's various dance partners). The notion that at Harrenhal Aerys coerced Ashara into a sexual relationship with him, whether it be brief (Harrenhal only) or longer term (mistress) is based on this ambiguously described set of events which obviously are open to multiple different interpretations.

3. The interpretation above fits the character of both Aerys and Rhaegar much better than a version that has Rhaegar making Ashara his mistress at basically the same time as he was also pursuing Lyanna. There is not a single description of him that suggests he was that slimy and horny. So a theory that has Rhaegar as Dany's father requires that Ashara NOT be her mother to be plausible, which once again means that we still have no explanation for how Ashara fits into all this.

4. If Ashara is not the mother, but Rhaegar is the father, you either fall back on the Jon and Dany as twins theory, or you uproot pretty much settled ideas about Jon just to make an only loosely supported theory for Dany (that Rhaegar and Lyanna's child is Dany and not Jon). And as I already said, Dany is all fire, DEEPLY tied to fire and blood magic, and it simply makes no sense to me at all that a child of Lyanna would bring dragons back into the world. A child of Lyanna would FIGHT with dragons to defend the North and all of the Seven Kingdoms, yes, but she would not be the one to bring the dragons back in the first place. Why? Because dragons are not a force of good. They are a necessary EVIL that the world will need at a specific time to fight a different evil, certainly, but that will also need to be destroyed to not become a huge problem in and of themselves.

[The Duck and the Field]

I don't know if I find it compelling, but the best argument I can think of is that Daenerys actually being a Targaryen is actually somewhat contrary to the themes of the story, at least as far as some have understood it. If Daenerys is Azor Ahai, or else one of the Three Heads of the Dragon, or some form of world-saving heroine, then all of the generations of Targaryens  before her were arguably justified in cementing hegemony over Westeros. All of the incest, the brutality, and the injustice was basically necessary to bring about the birth of a world-saving hero or group of world-saving heroes born from a special inbred bloodline. Some people believe that the story is meant to prompt readers to question that idea, and I believe it is from this that many draw their belief that Daenerys is not a trueborn Targaryen, but is instead a dragonseed or a Dayne or something.

Edited July 8, 2023 by The Duck and the Field

[Gilbert Green]

5 minutes ago, Hippocras said:

I think Aerys is more likely for several reasons.1. Rhaegar, at the time when he started looking for a new mother for a third child (because Elia's life would be in danger if she had more) he already had two. He only needed ONE more child with one mother, and he clearly chose Lyanna Stark.

This is a fair point.  And I feel somewhat uncomfortable with R+A=D for exactly this reason.

Ways can be found around the objection, of course.

7 minutes ago, Hippocras said:

2. Aerys caused some unspecified kind of trouble by showing up at Harrenhal unexpectedly, and Ashara was also "dishonoured" at Harrenhal.

Fair enough.  They were at the same place at the same time.  Place him on the list of suspects.

8 minutes ago, Hippocras said:

Aerys had a long and storied history of taking his liberties with women, whether they wanted it or not (he was the King - see Tywin's wedding) and he also had a history of taking a great deal of pleasure in shaming, undermining, and causing distress to people he believed had slighted him (see his actions against Tywin at same tournament).

Three objections.  Aerys' fetish was for MARRIED noblewomen; Ashara was not married.  Second, we are told that Aerys' randy period was over by this point -- he repented prior to the birth of Viserys and supposedly remained faithful to Rhaella thereafter.  Thirdly, we are getting close to the point where Aerys was supposedly incapable unless he burned someone alive, and we haven't heard that he burned anyone alive at Harrenhall.

18 minutes ago, Hippocras said:

4. If Ashara is not the mother, but Rhaegar is the father, you either fall back on the Jon and Dany as twins theory, or you uproot pretty much settled ideas about Jon just to make an only loosely supported theory for Dany (that Rhaegar and Lyanna's child is Dany and not Jon).

You listed this as if it were a point against R+A=D.  But actually it is a point against R+L=D.

Lyanna bearing twins cannot be ruled out.  It's just unlikely, for various reasons, that those twins were Jon and Dany.  Other combinations of twins cannot be ruled out.  And my mind remains open.

My own R+L = J+D hypothesis, which I am not committed to, holds that they are not twins but "Irish Twins", born less than a year apart, with Jon being older. 

Appealing to "settled ideas" is just an appeal to fan opinion, which has no authority.  The irony is that no fan has ever been able to construct a hypothetical timeline of Robert's Rebellion, apparently because they are too busy trying to hammer the timeline into standard R+L=J assumptions.   Which apparently leads to insoluble problems. 

But it is suddenly magically possible to construct a Robert's Rebellion timeline if you let standard assumptions go, and allow Jon to be born before the ToJ incident.    This might include Jon being born to Lyanna earlier in her 20+ month long "abduction".  In this case, the child presumably born at the ToJ would have to be someone else (possibly, but not necessarily, Dany).

[Lord Varys]

14 minutes ago, The Duck and the Field said:

I don't know if I find it compelling, but the best argument I can think of is that Daenerys actually being a Targaryen is actually somewhat contrary to the themes of the story, at least as far as some have understood it. If Daenerys is Azor Ahai, or else one of the Three Heads of the Dragon, or some form of world-saving heroine, then all of the generations of Targaryens  before her were arguably justified in cementing hegemony over Westeros. All of the incest, the brutality, and the injustice was basically necessary to bring about the birth of a world-saving hero or group of world-saving heroes born from a special inbred bloodline. Some people believe that the story is meant to prompt readers to question that idea, and I believe it is from this that many draw their belief that Daenerys is not a trueborn Targaryen, but is instead a dragonseed or a Dayne or something.

The idea that the point of the books is to question the marriage policy of a single family who is, effectively, extinguished in the actual book series.

The Targaryen conquest and central rule is already justified and actually celebrated quite explicitly in the books. Robb and Balon specifically, but also the various Baratheon pretenders rip the Realm apart ... which is at peace and reasonably prosperous in the very beginning under Robert's rule. Central rule is good, seven independent kingdoms is bad because it means perpetual war and infighting.

Of course, central rule is no magical guarantee for a paradise. It is still a feudal monarchy and many aspects suck. But it is clear that things are much better when there is just one king than when there are many.

The notion that the Targaryens are particularly 'brutal' or 'unjust' is not actually backed by the history.

On meta-level it is actually ironic and more fun if Aegon the Conqueror actually conquered Westeros to prepare the continent for the Others and the Long Night only for his descendants to actually fuck things up. Them looking into the wrong direction the entire time and making Aerys a mad tyrant and Rhaegar a love-sick nutjob who threw the Realm into chaos, undermining the search for the savior and obscuring his/her real identity/whereabouts is actually a pretty good plot.

For most of their time in Westeros the Targaryens actually had the means and the resources to take the Others head-on should they show up ... but their lost that momentum due to their own stupidity and now the savior(s) either don't know who they are and/or are at the wrong place to make a difference soon. That is no bad plotline at all.