The Happy Ending

[Raksha the Demon]

@Raksha the Demon

Sorry I was probably being a bit glib in my summary. I wasn't suggesting that JRR Tolkien wrote about their adventures together but was highlighting that their friendship endured and they went off together at the end and I've only read the authors work concerning Middle Earth. I had forgotten that some of the Elves stayed though!

I do hope the story will not end being more bitter than sweet, because it has already been extremely bitter. However based on the events so far it does seem likely to be that way.

I agree with your possible synopsis above (although I still think Stannis will make it to the end, although I suspect Davos is doomed).

No, no, not Davos! I want Davos to live! He's a good guy with smarts! It's bad enough that Ned Stark was killed; somebody with decency has to survive.

[Arkantos]

Seriously what the fuck is your problem?

It's GRRM's problem, the majority of undefended women get raped/killed at some point in the story, probably be LF doing the raping.

[1234567]

No, no, not Davos! I want Davos to live! He's a good guy with smarts! It's bad enough that Ned Stark was killed; somebody with decency has to survive.

Davos is truly one of the best men in the series and will risk his neck to do the right thing continually........this is why i think he won't make it. :crying:

[Queen Arya]

I am pro-Stark but after everything that already happened to the family, a happy ending is completely impossible. And for me, an ending that involves the death of Arya, Jaime, Tyrion or Jon is not bittersweet; it's just plain sad.

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my thoughts (and i already know they are almost impossible to happen):

Dany - will die before the end (Drogon kills her) but she will rule westeros for some time. She will love Jon after meeting him. After her death, i really hope we have another great council to decide the next king or queen.

Tyrion - he'll live... and will probably be the hand for Dany or at least some one very powerful and respected. he's one of the dragonriders.

Jaime - i really don't know what to think. Sometimes i believe he will have some sad and heroic death; Sometimes i believe he will save his kids from death (and killing Cersei in the process \o/) and just disappear with them and Brienne in the world.

Arya - As long as she doesn't die, it's fine with me. My nickname says what i want to happen with her but if she turns out to be an assassin or a military leader for the north it wouldn't be bad either. Oh, and she has to hook up with Gendry.

Jon - i really hope the north will be again a independent kingdom after the end of Dany's war. If that happens i think Jon will be the king, crowned as Jon Stark I (i think R+L = J is true and he will know it but Jon will prefer to be named Stark after knowing he is Robb's heir). He marries Val.

Sansa - she will become the female Littlefinger and will be very powerful.

Davos - I really really really want him to live and become the hand for Jon. but i think he'll die. :frown5:

Stannis - lord commander of the night's watch

Cersei - Jaime kills her... maybe to save tommen and Myrcella from certain death (Dany's army)

Sam - Maester... hopefully in Winterfell but most probably in the night's watch

Bran - when he is older, he goes back to the children of the forest and becomes Bloodraven 2.0. But before that he will be a dragonrider, warging Viserion

Theon - will be the king of the ironborn but Asha will be the one in charge. He will die trying to help the Starks

[voodooqueen126]

I think considering all the horrible things that have happened (most of Winterfell dying, Bran is likely to be tree for the rest of his life, Arya will likely be lost forever even if she doesn't die) even if they two surviving Stark children get their happy endings (Rickon becomes lord Sansa marries someone who loves her for herself) it would still count as a bitter sweet ending.

Oh and if the Elves leave at the LOTR

then that could be analogous the Children of the Forest dying out after the Others have been defeated and magic finally leaving the world.

[lostcause]

I think even if the story ends with all the remaining Starks getting to a place where they are content, it'll be bittersweet.

Catelyn and Robb being killed and brutally maimed post death - Catelyn is now a walking abomination intent on revenge.

Ned was killed in spite of promises for survival, sacrificing his precious honor and admitting himself a traitor with his final words. His daughters forever scarred by witnessing the event.

(these two scenes were awful to read for me)

Sansa is a pawn of LF, Arya is well on the way to being a heartless killer, Jon being dead/dying at the NW and Bran crippled and looks to be bound forever beyond the wall and Rickon is almost as feral as his wolf, after losing his parents and home.

Luckily there are 2 more books to come!

I'm hoping for a happy ending, but I can see the Others raging havoc on the North. I think Winterfell will fall, and which ever Starks remain will be lords of nothing, but bannermen to someone else, maybe White Harbor or whoever will sit on the Iron Throne (GRRM has said it'll be an unexpected person).

The 2 Starks I'm rooting for to see it through would be Jon and Arya. Arya has dodged and survived so many hardships and Jon is acting more a Stark than any of the others. He is in the North, and trying to save it from the looming threat.

However if Jon is L+R then I see him marrying Dany and either sitting on the throne or leaving to the west in the end, saying a final goodbye to Arya, just as they meet again.

I do think there will be a lot of similarity to LOTR, in that some will make it through, but there will be a lot of bitter departings as well, and magic will probably be leaving the world entirely.

Edit: The people saying Jon surviving would be cliche... first of all not in the world of GRRM, Jon is almost sure to die given the author. and B. there are so many situations already where the schemers and evil doers win the day, it would be a refreshing touch to an epic series, to see at least one of the honorable and dutysworn men to survive. I think we're down to Selmy, Davos and Jon (assuming he isn't dead) by now..

What, I'm a bastard myself, I have a liking of Jon!

[Raksha the Demon]

When did GRRM say that the person on the Iron Throne at the end of the saga will be someone unexpected? That's quite interesting; since it rules out Dany or Jon or even Aegon, not to mention Tommen or Myrcella I think.

Maybe it will be Bronn I!

Or Tyrion I.

Or Jaime I - it's not as if he hasn't tried out the seat already.

Barristan and Davos and Jon can form an Honorable Badass Club! I hope all three of them survive.

Practically anything can happen in the next two books...I wish GRRM would sit down and write them already!

[ARYa_Nym]

I don't think that quote was true since a source was never provided. I used to think it was true until this point was brought up.

In this interview he gave this summer he talks about Kings and Queens and Aragorn at the 55:55 mark.

Oooh, and based on what he said I think he might make Asha queen of the Ironborn!! The example he gave sounded like Asha.

From this I got the impression it will be someone who was already in power but made mistakes already.

[Catastrophe]

I think Rickon will end up being King, either in the North or on the Iron Throne. I can imagine the "bittersweet" ending, with Rickon finally getting his first and only POV chapter in the epilogue of the final book and dying of old age after a long life as King.

[Errant Bard]

I personally think that GRRM will make the ending of ASIoAF far less sweet and more bitter than the end of LOTR, but he could prove me wrong.

But your proposed ending seems sweeter than LOTR. It doesn't carry this terrible feeling of melancholy, loss, diminishing, and hurt; this sense of having won, but the world being inexorably changed nevertheless, and the winners having little joy or reward in this new world, abandoned by everything that was bigger than life.

There needs to be a Frodo. Death is too sweet for fiction characters.

[ARYa_Nym]

By the way, I hope Jon Snow isn't ASOIAF's Frodo. Jon's my favorite character, and I wouldn't want him to end up like Frodo, sick and scarred inside from his burden.

He's taller than Frodo.

http://www.westeros.org/Citadel/SSM/Entry/Many_Questions2/

& what does that mean? He's not Frodo or he won't be messed up like him? I hope it's not Bran. Poor thing.

[Verboten]

http://www.westeros....any_Questions2/

& what does that mean? He's not Frodo or he won't be messed up like him? I hope it's not Bran. Poor thing.

I think it'll be one or both of the girls. Rickon is too young to have had real memories of Winterfell and Bran is already broken.

[voodooqueen126]

I think it'll be one or both of the girls. Rickon is too young to have had real memories of Winterfell and Bran is already broken.

Arya then... I mean apparently the authors wife doesn't want her to die but there is no way that Arya can rejoin society after what she has been through.

[ARYa_Nym]

She was never meant to stay at Winterfell anyway so I don't care about that. As long as this was foreshadowing:

"I wish you were coming with us." "Different roads sometimes lead to the same castle. Who knows?"

Queen Nymeria burned all the ships so they could never go back home. She made a new life for herself in Dorne.

Whoever Frodo is there's no where to go off to like Frodo did. You can go to Essos but that's not really the same thing.

[Errant Bard]

Whoever Frodo is there's no where to go off to like Frodo did. You can go to Essos but that's not really the same thing.

Frodo leaving isn't really the point of his ending.

[ARYa_Nym]

Frodo leaving isn't really the point of his ending.

I didn't say that it was.

There's no where to go even if you have trouble reintegrating back into society. You have to live to survive.

[Catastrophe]

Also when I said Rickon would be taking the throne that means that all the other Starks would've had to have died before him. Presumably a long time before him, and not of old age. Though I can see Bran staying "alive" forever in a sort of bodiless spirit form.

[Errant Bard]

I didn't say that it was.

There's no where to go even if you have trouble reintegrating back into society. You have to live to survive.

But you're doing it again here. You don't have to go anywhere to be a Frodo, you just have to have been changed enough for the "victory" to mean nothing for you, and not be recognized by history or your former peers. It's about alienation and change.

[Silmarien]

Oh dear! Time for a reread. To be honest I read the Lord of the Rings when I was 12, so I am amazed I remember much of it at all. Sorry about any mistakes.

You didn't do too badly. Actually you hit all of the major plot points (

Scouring of the shire, fading of the elves, Arwen's separation from her mother, father, brothers/extended family for all eternity, Frodo's personal destruction to save the Shire vs. restoring shire, Elves joined to man (Aragorn marries Arwen), Sam goes on to have a great life, 16 kids, and sails off to join Frodo with the Elves after Rosie dies....etc

You mostly just mispelled Eowyn.

You did well!

If you could do that synopsis with The Silmarillion after only reading it when you were 12, I'd be UBER impressed.

[ARYa_Nym]

But you're doing it again here. You don't have to go anywhere to be a Frodo, you just have to have been changed enough for the "victory" to mean nothing for you, and not be recognized by history or your former peers. It's about alienation and change.

I didn't say that you have to go anywhere to be Frodo. I said whoever the Frodo of the story isn't going off somewhere like he did. They can still go through the feelings of alienation and change.