Heresy 32

[Tyryan Lannister]

Onto Thor:

Thor is, as we know, the son of Odin. He is also the ‘lightning god”. He is prophesized to die fighting the giant serpent Jörmungandr during the Ragnarok.

We already have a situation the fits the bill for Thor’s death: Lord Beric Dondarrion, the Lightning Lord, dies multiple times while fighting the “giant” Gregor Clegane… however, Beric never truly dies at Gregor’s hands, nor does he kill his “giant” like Thor is said to do. I believe that this is because, while they do embody elements of Thor v. Jörmungandr, they aren’t the actually representation of it, but are simply there to put us in the mindset for the REAL Thor:

Mance.

As I posted above, Mance could be Bloodraven’s son… which would make him Odin’s Son. Thor was said to be a great warrior, as Mance also is. Mance is also searching for the Horn of JORUMAN… which is a very obvious take from Jörmungandr. The HoJ is said to have “woken giants from the earth”… another connection. As has been speculated, Sam likely has the HoJ with him… Sam is also a big man, so maybe he in the end will kill Mance. However, Tormund is also a very big man, and called Giantsbane… another connection to giants… so maybe Tormund will in the end kill Mance. Or maybe the HoJ is a dragonhorn, and Mance will get hold of it, control a dragon, or “winged serpent”, and end up killing while being killed by it/another dragon in the end.

However, the outcome I like the best is that Mance will be killed by (and likely also kill :crying: ) Jon: if RLJ is true, then Jon is a Targ, which means that he is a DRAGON (“winged SERPENT”)

Now, rip me to shreds fellow Heretics!

EDIT: emoticons

[Tyryan Lannister]

I need a specific keyword to search my electronic version of Dance, as I think there are references to the "gods" making it snow. And I think that's a distinct possibility. All those sleepy, little greenseer singers, singing away for snow.

In MN, we got a light dusting of snow yesterday. Little Wing, I'm envious of your more liberal downfall! I love snow!

O me too, really hope we don't have a winter like last year (no significant snow fall till mid-January :frown5: )

[Black Crow]

I don't know about the Children "making" it snow, but during the Long Night they were pretty well impossible to find because they had bunkered down for the winter in their hollow hills and I think that this is exactly what we're seeing in ADwD. Leaf, Bloodraven and the gang are in the cave, guarded by the wights outside* and those that Bran/Hodor encounters round the back are settling down to hibernate.

* yes I know its ambiguous, but I think that they are the wards on the entrance. Remember that Summer goes into the caves with them and then periodically emerges again to go hunting. We're told that he needs to tunnel through the snow to escape, but we're conspicuously not told he needs to chew his way through the wights every time he goes in and out.

[Little Wing]

In MN, we got a light dusting of snow yesterday. Little Wing, I'm envious of your more liberal downfall! I love snow!

Ah, I don't mind the snow as much as the winds! Can't go anywhere... a mighty scary wind, I tell ya!

I'm looking forward to your theories, Tyryan, keep 'em coming!

[Black Crow]

O me too, really hope we don't have a winter like last year (no significant snow fall till mid-January :frown5: )

We had some last week, caused gridlock on the roads and then got rained away within 48 hours, but we're confidently expecting more to come.

(no wonder this thread moves so fast when we stuff it with weather forecasts)

[Tyryan Lannister]

Ah, I don't mind the snow as much as the winds! Can't go anywhere... a mighty scary wind, I tell ya!

I'm looking forward to your theories, Tyryan, keep 'em coming!

The three posts up there are all I have for now... just a little something I thought up while in the shower this morning

[Tyryan Lannister]

We had some last week, caused gridlock on the roads and then got rained away within 48 hours, but we're confidently expecting more to come.

(no wonder this thread moves so fast when we stuff it with weather forecasts)

But we're still 3 back of RLJ, so let's keep it up!

[Black Crow]

However, the outcome I like the best is that Mance will be killed by (and likely also kill :crying: ) Jon: if RLJ is true, then Jon is a Targ, which means that he is a DRAGON (“winged SERPENT”)

I'm fairly confident Jon will kill Mance, but don't think that's anything to do with his being a possible Targaryen. Blood will out (especially in Martin's World) and Jon's is Winter blood.

[Runaway Penguin]

Re. building of the Wall...

As A.C. Clarke said, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

To build the Wall by human means, Pykrete can be used. Result is "ice concrete". It would definitely be "advanced technology", yet attainable even by medieval means - if you have means to build hundreds of miles long and hundred of feet tall wall, building two seawater aqueducts and enough sawmills is the least of your trouble. Have mammoths power the pumps needed to pump seawater into a handy artificial lake on a mountain and then just go through the aqueduct. Or use normal water.

Giants may be also the ones to handle blocks of ice without stripping the skin off their palms.

(Yep, very un-fantasy-like explanation - but for later inhabitants who forgot the trick it would be magic. After all even today we have people who refuse to believe that Pyramids were built by ancient builders).

Anyway, there still is "real" magic in the Wall, but the basic concept is "magic isn't free". So what if the magic is encased ina very fragile barrier - and the Wall as we know it is generally protecting this? Then it would even make sense for the NW to continue its growth. Outer and higher layers of the Wall may be formed by simple ice after NW forgot the know-how (maybe even after the unpleasantness with Night's King).

[Tyryan Lannister]

I'm fairly confident Jon will kill Mance, but don't think that's anything to do with his being a possible Targaryen. Blood will out (especially in Martin's World) and Jon's is Winter blood.

What I'm getting at here is that, if Mance = Thor, then the significance of RLJ is that Jon could be called a "serpent", thus equating him to Jormungandr and meaning that the two of them will fight to the death... with possibly both dying in the process (Jon becomes the series top-Hero but has to die in the process type of thing, which is rather bittersweet I'd say)

ETA: also, if Mance is simply the child of a wildling and not Bloodraven's brood as I speculate, then he is also of Winter's Blood (in a sense... he would be of a family of the far north and such) and even if he is BR's son, he has both Fire Blood and Earth/Winter/First Men blood in him from both his most likely wildling mother and his Blackwood grandmother, so saying "blood will out and therefore Jon's Winter blood will cause him to beat Mance" doesn't really work, since Winter vs Winter doesn't really give a clear winner...also, Tormund seems to imply that Mance has fought not only a bunch of Wights, but also some WW, so Mance fighting a "child of winter" (as you propose Jon is... and I do agree with this) could very well end in Mance winning the fight... whereas Mance as Thor fighting Jon as Ice Serpent would lead to them both dying in the end.

[Little Wing]

Yeah, but the times when the building of the Wall took place weren't really medieval to start with. It's present day Westeros that's medieval....

/nitpicking

Oh, and I didn't mean to make a topic out of the weather, just commented on it in the "Winter is coming" spirit of things. And it's not the reason Heresy has been so fast pacing lately, we've not talked weather at all in them :cool4: it's the influx of "other thinking"^TM

Edit - spelling

[Melifeather]

Skin only sticks to ice when damp, so as long as you wear mittens and don't stick your tongue onto it, you should be fine.

@Runaway Penguin brings up an interesting point regarding seawater...it seems probable, since the Wall stretches from The Bay of Ice to the Bay of Seals.

I am expecting a "big reveal", and not just for Jon, but Mance as well. He is not who he is presented to be. Melisandre isn't the only one with an agenda. I think when it comes to Mance we should anticipate almost the complete opposite from what the general consensus is. I'm just going off a gut feeling here. For such a powerful man, he was fairly complacent in his conspiracy with Melisandre...almost too willing. I still adhere to a "Mance wrote the pink letter" theory and has Ramsay in a cage instead of the other way around. And for some reason, Mance wants Jon to come to Winterfell.

[Runaway Penguin]

Still when the Wall was built, atleast according to the legends, the First Men had steel already. So OK, not Medieval, just Iron Age - which is even better for our allegory, as many Roman era big constructions were later rumored to be built by giants, as the technology and organisation skills were forgotten during the dark age... And that was just few hundred years, not thousands... :)

[Black Crow]

What I'm getting at here is that, if Mance = Thor, then the significance of RLJ is that Jon could be called a "serpent", thus equating him to Jormungandr and meaning that the two of them will fight to the death... with possibly both dying in the process (Jon becomes the series top-Hero but has to die in the process type of thing, which is rather bittersweet I'd say)

I do agree that Jon is doomed, as I've mentioned before that imagery of the dying Cu Chulainn with the crow in his shoulder - first Mormont's, then his and always the Morrigan - is too good not to use. OK we've seen a foreshadowing of it with the faceless man on the bridge, but I can easily see it being rolled out with full orchestra for Jon

[Black Crow]

I am expecting a "big reveal", and not just for Jon, but Mance as well. He is not who he is presented to be. Melisandre isn't the only one with an agenda. I think when it comes to Mance we should anticipate almost the complete opposite from what the general consensus is. I'm just going off a gut feeling here. For such a powerful man, he was fairly complacent in his conspiracy with Melisandre...almost too willing. I still adhere to a "Mance wrote the pink letter" theory and has Ramsay in a cage instead of the other way around. And for some reason, Mance wants Jon to come to Winterfell.

Don't know about the cage, but otherwise I'm in agreement. Given the confirmation that Mel is essentially a con-artist and probably way out of her depth, I have to wonder which one of them is really pulling the strings. On the surface Mel has passed up the opportunity to burn a real live and kicking king, just so that he can go and rescue Arya and get Jon to trust her, a scenario which really doesn't convince. Mance, I suspect may have pulled rank on her.

[Melifeather]

If Jon survives his stabbing only to die at the end...I think I'll cry. :bawl:

I like Daenerys too, but she seems to fill the Christ-like character who will die in the end. Ah, but I guess that's how Martin works....the one you expect, won't, and the one you don't expect, will.

[Black Crow]

Sadly, I reckon Jon has Doomed tattooed right across his forehead.

[Little Wing]

Sadly, I reckon Jon has Doomed tattooed right across his forehead.

Nah, it's Dany. Me Nem Nesa. ;)

[Black Crow]

Nah, it's Dany. Me Nem Nesa. ;)

Oh I quite agree and I'm looking forward to Jon doing the deed to save Westeros from the dragons and restore the balance between Winter and Summer, but just as Bran is now going into the earth, so it may be Jon's turn to go into the ice to herald the return of summer.

[brut]

Considering the many assumptions of this board: if Mance is the son of Bloodraven and a Craster's daughter, doesn't it make him part dragon and part wolf, just like Jon. Which establishes the validity of Yigritte's claim that Mance would want to have Ned Stark's bastard. Also, the whole business of how Jon is accepted by Mance almost indicates that the latter has a pretty good idea of who Jon actually is. So, it should not come as a surprise if Mance is the one revealing to Jon who his true parents are.

Finally knowing that Ciaran is casted for Mance makes me feel like he will be the new Ned.