He's not dead

[Carey Snow]

I am of the theory that it was all Magic on Mel's end and the stabbers were involved in the "trick". Somehow Mel was able to create a shadow or body that looked like Jon and Jon was able to warg into it. Then certain Nights Watchmen were instructed to stab him. This allows Jon to fake his death and go off in search of Arya and secure Winterfell with his wildling army. It also allows the "New" Lord Commander of the Night's Watch (who will end up mostly being controlled by Mel) to lose a battle with the Others and allow them past the wall and into the Seven Kingdoms.

Mel foresaw this "assassination attempt" and may have even come up with the plot. She obviously wants to keep Jon alive but she also wants control of the wall. She may have made up the note and everything about Arya. This gives Jon an incentive to leave the wall and is able to further the plot and clean up the North quite a bit. Mel is able to better control the next Lord Commander and decides she can take on the Others herself and leaves the Wall vulnerable. What Mel does not see is that she loses the battle with the others and lets them into Westeros.

[solarbear]

Jon is most likely not dead. He is a major character who has achieved nothing in the grand scheme of things. He will either succeed or fail in whatever his main conflict is.

Returning as undead - would be lame.

Returning in another body - equally lame.

He most likely has to be saved by magic - Mel most likely.

[Val the Wildling Princess]

I agree with the ones who think he is going into a coma like Bran was in AGOT and meanwhile he is gonna be inside Ghost and become an even more powerful warg. I just don't want and UnJon, zombieJon or whatever.

[alienarea]

In my understanding of storytelling either Bran or Jon will be the Stark champion. So for Jon to live Bran needs to become a tree and fade out of the story. It also depends on where GRRM is going with the story: Dany & Jon vs. Others or Dany vs. Bran. It would be an irony if Jaime missed the chance to kill the evil villain (Bran) early on.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

In my understanding of storytelling either Bran or Jon will be the Stark champion. So for Jon to live Bran needs to become a tree and fade out of the story. It also depends on where GRRM is going with the story: Dany & Jon vs. Others or Dany vs. Bran. It would be an irony if Jaime missed the chance to kill the evil villain (Bran) early on.

While I can believe that the Children and Bloodraven might not be exactly what they seem, I have to admit I'm still clueless as to where "Bran is the big villain" idea is coming from. I just don't see it, sorry.

As for Jon being the Stark champion, I think he'll be much more than that. He's not "just" a Stark. I also don't see why Jon and Bran's survival/importance are mutually exclusive. Why does Bran have to become a tree for Jon to live?

[Lord Damian]

It would be pretty dark if Rickon dies, he is only a small child that has had to grow up with the loss of just about everyone around him except his wolf. Rickon also has no experience of any kind as far as a lordling is concerned due to being so young. I see him as the most likely witnessing events around him and warging here and there into shaggy but not much more.

[LadyMary]

While I can believe that the Children and Bloodraven might not be exactly what they seem, I have to admit I'm still clueless as to where "Bran is the big villain" idea is coming from. I just don't see it, sorry.

As for Jon being the Stark champion, I think he'll be much more than that. He's not "just" a Stark. I also don't see why Jon and Bran's survival/importance are mutually exclusive. Why does Bran have to become a tree for Jon to live?

I don;t think Bran is going to be the big villain but he's powerful and using his power in ways that are not entirely for the good. Bran was an innocent kid but without someone to teach him, he has used his warging ability to mindrape Hodor who clearly is frightened by the invasion by Bran. Bran convinces himself that Hodor doesn't mind, but the story says otherwise. So, he's a very powerful warg who had nobody to teach him not to use his powers for a malign or selfish purpose. Maybe now that he has a Master in Bloodraven, he will stop assaulting poor Hodor's mind, at least I hope so.

I think Bloodraven is mainly not a bad guy and is doing what he feels is his destiny, but he basically lured Bran to the cold North under somewhat false pretenses. It may be a case of the ends justifies the means.

Bloodraven has outlived a normal human lifespan and maybe he wants to pass the torch and die so he needs a replacement and finds one in Bran; a boy who has mind powers but crippled legs who will never fulfill his dream of becoming a knight. Bloodraven could give Bran something he would never have lying crippled in a bed a Winterfell, hope, but more importantly for a boy who liked to climb, the ability to fly and see things far beyond his confining body. Meanwhile, Bloodraven can teach him so that Bran can succeed him.

Basically, Bloodraven manipulated Bran as Bran manipulates Hodor, but he didn't do it for "evil" purposes - as far as we know. I think he did it because there must be a greenseer and Bloodraven can't continue on in his current state forever. Bran may learn to use his powers in an invasive way for purposes of keeping the balance of power, but it is still manipulative and hurts people.

[alienarea]

While I can believe that the Children and Bloodraven might not be exactly what they seem, I have to admit I'm still clueless as to where "Bran is the big villain" idea is coming from. I just don't see it, sorry.

As for Jon being the Stark champion, I think he'll be much more than that. He's not "just" a Stark. I also don't see why Jon and Bran's survival/importance are mutually exclusive. Why does Bran have to become a tree for Jon to live?

The classic understanding of storytelling requires a hero and a villain. ASoIaF is not a typical story with black-and-white characters in a good-vs-evil conflict but grey, i.e. I expect a hero of ice vs a hero of fire. The hero of fire will most likely be Dany, and I expect the hero of ice to be her opponent - either Jon or Bran. That is why I expect either Bran or Jon to die for good.

[Black Crow]

While I can believe that the Children and Bloodraven might not be exactly what they seem, I have to admit I'm still clueless as to where "Bran is the big villain" idea is coming from. I just don't see it, sorry.

As for Jon being the Stark champion, I think he'll be much more than that. He's not "just" a Stark. I also don't see why Jon and Bran's survival/importance are mutually exclusive. Why does Bran have to become a tree for Jon to live?

:agree:

I think one of the things which is so different about a Song of Ice and Fire is that there is no clear cut fight between good and evil.

[just want to search]

:agree:

I think one of the things which is so different about a Song of Ice and Fire is that there is no clear cut fight between good and evil.

i would go even further and say that most of us (including me) are rooting for the starks , which appeared to be too clean so far and now slowly it creeps to our mind

that they are not that clean, maybe they'll be the darkest (with reanimating the dead - which is kinda evil) , and because we are too attached to them (thanks to GRRM)

we will root for them. most of the storys expect you to be glad for the good guys and hate the bad guys.

but something tells me that out of the two grey opposing forces we will actually root for the more evil one (stark) and have our bittersweet ending (sweet - the man won bitter- the starks lost).

[Ghost714]

I don;t think Bran is going to be the big villain but he's powerful and using his power in ways that are not entirely for the good. Bran was an innocent kid but without someone to teach him, he has used his warging ability to mindrape Hodor who clearly is frightened by the invasion by Bran. Bran convinces himself that Hodor doesn't mind, but the story says otherwise. So, he's a very powerful warg who had nobody to teach him not to use his powers for a malign or selfish purpose. Maybe now that he has a Master in Bloodraven, he will stop assaulting poor Hodor's mind, at least I hope so.

I think Bloodraven is mainly not a bad guy and is doing what he feels is his destiny, but he basically lured Bran to the cold North under somewhat false pretenses. It may be a case of the ends justifies the means.

Bloodraven has outlived a normal human lifespan and maybe he wants to pass the torch and die so he needs a replacement and finds one in Bran; a boy who has mind powers but crippled legs who will never fulfill his dream of becoming a knight. Bloodraven could give Bran something he would never have lying crippled in a bed a Winterfell, hope, but more importantly for a boy who liked to climb, the ability to fly and see things far beyond his confining body. Meanwhile, Bloodraven can teach him so that Bran can succeed him.

Basically, Bloodraven manipulated Bran as Bran manipulates Hodor, but he didn't do it for "evil" purposes - as far as we know. I think he did it because there must be a greenseer and Bloodraven can't continue on in his current state forever. Bran may learn to use his powers in an invasive way for purposes of keeping the balance of power, but it is still manipulative and hurts people.

Vayamir six skins had a mentor to teach him to use his abilities, and he used his to rape weman. Almost anytime a warg uses his ability to warg, it's for personal gain. I don't think that means Bran is going to be a bad guy. He also has done a lot of good by warg-ing into Hodor. He calmed him down in that storm to keep the Magner of Thenn and his people from finding all of them in the top of that keep. He warged into Hodor to fight off the Weights, I mean the list goes on. Over all I would say Bran warg-ing into Hodor has been a good thing....so I really can't see that as reason for him being a bad guy in the future.

[FanTasy]

Edit: sorry, off topic reply.

[jon rr stark]

First i'm going to have to apologise for my writing, english is not my first language but i hope it's good enough to get my point across.

I know that the majority of people in here thinks Jon Snow will not die or that he won't be dead for a long time. I'm going to give you my reason why i think he can't be dead, according to a rule in the narrative that George uses in this series of books.

Now we all know that in every chapter of every POV character there's an external narrator telling the story. This narrator knows exactly the same things that the character knows, nothing more and nothing else.

At the end of the last paragraph the narrator says that he never felt the fourth knife. So if Jon couldn't felt the blade or see it (his face was deep on the snow) at this moment, how could the narrator know that the character was stabbed for a fouth time if Jon didn't in fact survived in any shape or form?

I might be mistaken and this narrator rule is not always applied by George, although in my readings i allways felt he respect it.

I think that the last two lines of the final chapter of Jon are meant to indicate the readers that somehow he survives and the way of it (this might be more difficult to figure it out). What do you people think about this?

This is exactly what i thought when I read it. The narrative switchs to a retrospective view near the end of this pov. Jon is alive, just a little bit unwell for now.

[slayer420]

I posted this in the wrong tread so I will post it here again

There was a few lines in AGOTs I think that talks about the knives of the Nightswatch. I cant find it thought. It was talking about how they didnt carry there swords but allways had there knives with them. I think it was something like they were not long enougth to kill a man but they could slit his troat. Not sure about this. Any one have a E book with search that can find it?

[Brucolac]

Just looked at this thread for the first time, and I actually saw something pertaining to it yesterday. Consensus is that Jon wargs into Ghost and will probably rejoin his body later. What isn't clear is if a warg can keep their humanity for any length of time while residing in an animal. While the direwolves seem pretty clever, that might not be enough. Jon can sense the network in the weirwoods. When he is in Whitetree in ACoK, he feels power coming from the weirwood there. Maybe he will use them as a host if he finds ghost too small to hold him, gaining insight into his past and a way to communicate with Bran before he is reborn.

[Ghost714]

The classic understanding of storytelling requires a hero and a villain. ASoIaF is not a typical story with black-and-white characters in a good-vs-evil conflict but grey, i.e. I expect a hero of ice vs a hero of fire. The hero of fire will most likely be Dany, and I expect the hero of ice to be her opponent - either Jon or Bran. That is why I expect either Bran or Jon to die for good.

Why can't "the hero of ice " (AKA Dany's opponent) be the Others???

Why does it have to be Jon or Bran? I mean if anything the Others represent ice way more than anyone else. They come when it's most cold, they have ice like weaponry. They are said to ride giant ICE spiders. They live the furthest North, the list goes on....

I know there is nothing in these book that is white or black. So I know the Others probably aren't as evil as we have been led to believe they are. But still if there is an "opponent" against "fire" that must be "ice" my money is on it being the Others.

[Ser Lepus]

Why can't "the hero of ice " (AKA Dany's opponent) be the Others???

Why does it have to be Jon or Bran? I mean if anything the Others represent ice way more than anyone else. They come when it's most cold, they have ice like weaponry. They are said to ride giant ICE spiders. They live the furthest North, the list goes on....

I know there is nothing in these book that is white or black. So I know the Others probably aren't as evil as we have been led to believe they are. But still if there is an "opponent" against "fire" that must be "ice" my money is on it being the Others.

Because they have been barely developed as characters...as a matter of fact, they have had very little effect on the story, besides pushing the wildlings south (which has happened off-screen); truth to be told, the story to date could be rewritten with few changes and leaving out the Others...

I don´t doubt they are important, the same way the winter is important, the Doom of Valyria is important, and plague and famine are important, but they are not main characters, they aren´t worthy antagonists...

I´m not saying that Jon or Bran are going to become the "champions of ice", but, IF (and it is a big IF), there must be a "champion of ice", it can´t be the Others; it must be a main character.

[slayer420]

Well i think that if there is a chapion of ice it would be the family with the family modio WINTER IS COMING, had a great sword named Ice and was once know as The kings of winter. I dont think GRRM could spell it out any clearer

[Val the Wildling Princess]

Just looked at this thread for the first time, and I actually saw something pertaining to it yesterday. Consensus is that Jon wargs into Ghost and will probably rejoin his body later. What isn't clear is if a warg can keep their humanity for any length of time while residing in an animal. While the direwolves seem pretty clever, that might not be enough. Jon can sense the network in the weirwoods. When he is in Whitetree in ACoK, he feels power coming from the weirwood there. Maybe he will use them as a host if he finds ghost too small to hold him, gaining insight into his past and a way to communicate with Bran before he is reborn.

This is interesting. On the ADWD prologue Haggon says to Varamyr that when the human body of a warg dies and his spirit gets into a host (a beast in this case) eventually, there will be no more man, only the beast as a result of losing his humanity. So it would be interesting to know if this happens also if the body doesn't die but it's in a coma. We know that Bran was in a coma (can't remember for how long, sorry) and he warged Summer while he was unconscious and apparently nothing happened to him, so if Jon is in the same situation he should be safe. But what if his body is dead, he wargs into Ghost and then he is resurrected/reborn? According to Haggon a part of his humanity would be lost if he stays long inside Ghost, but again, how long?

[The Great Cornholio!]

Well, if GRRM releases a list of POV's and Jon is on it we'll know he survived. However, my guess he he would try and keep it secret for a long time.