[ADWD spoilers] Jon Snow's Fate

[Bromosapian]

Why is everyone so set on resurrection? You can survive multiple stab wounds. It happens.

[Suldog]

Why is everyone so set on resurrection? You can survive multiple stab wounds. It happens.

Oh, from your lips to GRRM's ears. It would make the ciffhanger even cheaper and stupider, but would be a much better option than any other, imo.

[paddington]

Why is everyone so set on resurrection? You can survive multiple stab wounds. It happens.

Sure they could have missed the the Artries in the neck, bounced a blade of the shoulder blade. Slid one off a rib.

All 3 I doubt, one knife wounds gone into something important.

[strings]

Why is everyone so set on resurrection? You can survive multiple stab wounds. It happens.

Yeah but then you also have to explain why the 4+ men that were close enough for knives and intent on killing him just stopped and thought, "well i suppose he's learned his lesson..." Unless someone comes to his rescue which i don't really see as realistic considering how quick it happens.

[DaNmarner]

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: So why did you kill Jon Snow?

GEORGE R.R. MARTIN: Oh, you think he’s dead, do you?

[howland_reed]

Yeah but then you also have to explain why the 4+ men that were close enough for knives and intent on killing him just stopped and thought, "well i suppose he's learned his lesson..." Unless someone comes to his rescue which i don't really see as realistic considering how quick it happens.

Isn't Wun Wun, who just ripped the head off Ser Patrek, near Jon?

Also, no mention of any blood, but rather smoking wounds...makes you wonder if Melisandre protected him with some type of shadow spell. I'm sure glamour and shadow babies aren't the only tricks up her sleeves.

[Sun]

Methods by which Jon will come back, as I see them:

He's grievously wounded and Milisander heals him à la Victarian's hand and he rises as Jon-lava man- Snow... a song of ice and fire? (imo, the ideal solution and the reason we were introduced to Victarian's hand in the first place)

Jon's wounds prove not fatal, Val and Milisander nurse him back to health (hard to believe for all 4 wounds)

Jon dies and comes back as UnJon (Please no!)

Jon dies and is brought back to life via a sacrifice, probably Milisander trades her life for his. (I'm ok with this one too)

There are probably more options but I can't think of any. Also, I'm willing to bet that before he is revived Jon's soul will spend some time in Ghost, and his body in an ice cell.

[MinotaurWarrior]

Jon's direwolf is named Ghost.

Wargs can live on in one of their second skins.

Jon's direwolf is named Ghost.

This is the best forshadowing I think I've ever read.

[Selmy]

So if anyone read the transcript from Comic Con about GoT, someone asked Kit Harrington, the kid playing Jon Snow, if he knew who was Jon Snow's mother. GRRM joked that if he did know, he'd had to kill him.

Jon Snow's parentage seems to be one of the larger secrets of ASoIaF and one very close to GRRM. I don't think he would let Jon die without that secret being revealed.

[dreamcatcher]

Why is everyone so set on resurrection? You can survive multiple stab wounds. It happens.

I think he did experience true death because of how Varamyr Sixskins died:

True death came suddenly; he felt a shock of cold, as if he had been plunged into the icy waters of a frozen lake. Then he found himself rushing over moonlit snows with his packmates close behind him. Half the world was dark. One Eye, he knew. He bayed, and Sly and Stalker gave echo.

And Jon:

He never felt the fourth knife. Only the cold …

[Tonythetiger]

Jon surviving his wounds does not advance the plot. Which would make the whole killing him pointless. He would still be LCC with all the limitations that come with that. As long as he is LCC he cannot marry dany or participate in realm politics.

If he is to become the PtwP or AA he needs to at least be seen as dead while surviving, just like Bran, Rickon, Ayra, Aegon, the Onion knight among others whose deaths have been faked.

One of the ways that this is possible is use of glamor by Mel so that the person who was killed was not infact Jon but someone else. This advances the plot by enabling Jon to pursue and fulfill all the prophecies of AA while also being reborn.

So just like Ayra, Bran and the Onion Knight, it is when they appear to be dead that they are then able to follow their true paths as characters. While GRRM has used fake death often, it is always as a means to advance the plot. If it was in fact Jon that was stabbed and he survives, we are back to where we started and that's just not how GRRM roles.

So the question we should be asking ourselves is WHY? what benefit do we get from Jon dying or appearing to die?

Note: for those saying that Jon warged into ghost...he did not know how to. Bran had to be trained how to do it and so was varamyr. It is unlikely that he would have dont that without training.

[MinotaurWarrior]

Every warg we've seen die has changed skins upon death. Varamyr was taught a bunch of things that Starks such as Arya figured out on their own, and at some point someone must have figured out how to warg beyond the grave on his own (things must be learned before they can be taught). Also, Ghost is named Ghost, and would become possessed by Jon's ghost.

What do we get from Jon being stabbed? The NW / Stannis / Wildling alliance crumbles, Jon is cast out, stripped of his authority, and left to try to fight the Others without any real power (especially as Ghost, since he wouldn't even be able to communicate).

[dreamcatcher]

One of the ways that this is possible is use of glamor by Mel so that the person who was killed was not infact Jon but someone else. This advances the plot by enabling Jon to pursue and fulfill all the prophecies of AA while also being reborn.

Note: for those saying that Jon warged into ghost...he did not know how to. Bran had to be trained how to do it and so was varamyr. It is unlikely that he would have dont that without training.

1. The person that was stabbed WAS Jon, we see into his head. His last thoughts were "stick'em with the pointy end" and "ghost".

2. Jon already knows how to warg and he knows he is one. So does Arya. Neither of them were trained. Not to the level of Bran (warging into people), but he does warg.

[Wrathchild]

My best guess is Jon is saved by Melisandre in one way or another. Stannis is still alive (If he weren't, shouldn't Ramsay have Theon and fake arya back?)and eventually finds Melisandre/Jon, as odds are they either own the wall thanks to the wildlings or have gone into hiding.

Jon, very obviously no longer a member of the NW as far as they're concerned, is now free to be legitimized by Stannis. Stannis grants him Winterfell, he steals val, and rebuilds the watch as the new Warden of the North and Lord of Winterfell. Then he turns his efforts to defending the north from the Others.

But that's too neat and pretty. I guess GRRM will probably just kill everyone or something. It is known.

[Eaglewood]

Here's how I see it playing out:

1. He is defiantly spending some time in Ghost. There has simply been too much foreshadowing for that not to happen. The question will be how long he is "warged" into the wolf. A short time? Longer? It's hard to say, but the length of time he is out the greater chance of the wall being destroyed.

2. Mel will resurrect him. This is pretty much also a given, but it's tied to the question of how long he will be in Ghost. She may try to give him the "Gift of Life" but find -- unlike Beric and Cat -- there is nothing to bring back. The true "Jon" is beyond her reach.

3. When Jon is resurrected he will not be like UnCat or UnBeric, who were ghastly shells of their previous themselves. He will return to whole, as he was able to warg whole into Ghost at the time of his "death", and Mel will finally see him as AA.

Questions still left: is he bound to his vows? Good question. Even if he was no longer bound, would Jon still run to Winterfell? What happens to the Night Watch, the oldest institution on the planet? A lot of good questions there.

[Morvius]

Somehow I felt as though this was a cheap way for GRRM to end Jon's story on a cliffhanger.

I want him to be alive. But at the same time I would be pissed if this turns out to be a cheap cliffhanger to make us more eager for the next book.

[bacchys]

I just don't see any plausible way that Jon lives through this. At the same time, it makes no sense to kill him. So WTF?

Maybe Jon wargs into Ghost and then heads south to hook up with Nymeria and then they get together with Rickon and Shaggy or they go to the Vale and become Sansa's mystical wolf protectors. That sounds kind of stupid and fairytale-ish though.

So, again, I really don't like what GRRM has done here. I just don't get it at all. Oh well, guess we'll find out in a few years.

Melisandre is at the wall, and GRRM has shown us more than once the Red Priests are capable of healing people, not just bringing them back from the dead.

GRRM only showed us Jon getting stabbed four times. Bowen Marsh isn't quite Brutus, who had dozens of Senators with him when they cut down Caesar. Four wounds, with Melisandre close at hand, is plausibly survivable.

I'd rather this wasn't a way to get Jon out of his Oath, personally. I don't think it is. This is Jon's third temptation to be an oathbreaker (like Aemon's three). In his previous two attempts, his "brothers" in the Watch save him from himself. Though it's not their intent, Marsh and the his other attackers have saved him from himself again.

[Selmy]

I think he's dead and they're going to burn his body, as they do with all the dead. Only he's going to climb out of the fire with Longclaw on fire and glowing all AA-ish.

[Rindill]

Why is everyone overlooking the Warthog warg?

We know that wargs can...

1. Take over any animal they want.

2. Try to take over humans.

Jon gave the other warg as the reason Ghost was restless, but Greywind also was restless before the Red Wedding.

That warg could have...

1. Taken over Wun Wun

2. Attempted to control Jon as he was being stabbed (unable to get Longclaw out)

3. Taken over various of the Night's Watch (causing them to stab John) - as his first assailant seemed taken aback after Jon disarmed him.

However, I see it much more likely that Bowen Marsh et al had been planning this for quite awhile, and that it had more to do with Jon's allowing the Wildlings through and other compromises.

Jon forsaking his vows and Ramsay's defeating Stannis simply put the nail in the coffin for Jon.

[Dragons Dancing]

Why is everyone so set on resurrection? You can survive multiple stab wounds. It happens.

I agree. I think it is a possibility that he survives and GRRM will certainly use him to continue the plot line. I just think it is too early for Jon to turn into a wolf, or AA, or a frozen mummy with a fire sword. The dragons aren't even in Westeros yet. I can see how he might be transformed in the final book but what the heck is he going to do during the next book while other characters including the Others get into their places for the grand finale?