These Books are Often Praised as Being Realistic

[Nephenee]

Robert forgave Tywin and kept him as Lord Paramount of the West, he certainly had enough power and credibility to tell the rest what happened.

"Lord Tywin, who told you this?"

"My son Jaime, your Grace."

Credibility gone.

[TheMysteriousOne]

"Lord Tywin, who told you this?"

"My son Jaime, your Grace."

Credibility gone.

Tywin can lie.

[Groat]

But Tywin didn't have much power anymore, compared to people like Jon Arryn, Robert and Ned and even Barristan.

I know, it's not like Tywin had his daughter become queen after the war or anything, no power.

[danm_999]

"Lord Tywin, who told you this?"

"My son Jaime, your Grace."

Credibility gone.

Yeah, it's not like the huge caches of wildfire strategically placed around the city would corroborate the story or anything.

And after all, Robert was always predisposed to think the best of Aerys.

[Nephenee]

Tywin can lie.

I don't think Tywin cared much for the well being of King's Landing, and he was already far away from King's Landing. Too far away to tell Robert. It would have to be Cersei, and she doesn't really care about King's Landing either.

I don't really blame Jaime for not telling people about the wildfire caches, though. Robert and Ned screwed him over and caused him to be hated by pretty much everyone by naming him Kingslayer.

I know, it's not like Tywin had his daughter become queen after the war or anything, no power.

A beautiful straw man. I never claimed that Tywin had no power. I said "anymore," meaning that he didn't have much power compared to when he was Hand of the King.

Yeah, it's not like the huge caches of wildfire strategically placed around the city would corroborate the story or anything.

And after all, Robert was always predisposed to think the best of Aerys.

Ugh, at least have a good argument if you're going to be sarcastic. Judging from the fact that they haven't been found for 17 years, they seem to be very hard to find. And Jaime didn't know where they were, either.

[danm_999]

Ugh, at least have a good argument if you're going to be sarcastic. Judging from the fact that they haven't been found for 17 years, they seem to be very hard to find. And Jaime didn't know where they were, either.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

“My Sworn Brothers were all away, you see, but Aerys liked to keep me close. I was my father’s son, so he did not trust me. He wanted me where Varys could watch me, day and night. So I heard it all.” He remembered how Rossart’s eyes would shine when he unrolled his maps to show where the substance must be placed. Garigus and Belis were the same.

So His Grace commanded his alchemists to place caches of wildfire all over King’s Landing. Beneath Baelor’s Sept and the hovels of Flea Bottom, under stables and storehouses, at all seven gates, even in the cellars of the Red Keep itself.

Yeah, however would Jaime ever find any of the caches? It's not like he wasn't there, and distinctly mentions remembering, the location of them.

And dang, suppose he somehow forgot everything he seems to have remembered 17 years after the fact, it's not like he had ample opportunity to interrogate several alchemists who were in on it;

Days later, I hunted down the others and slew them as well. Belis offered me gold, and Garigus wept for mercy. Well, a sword’s more merciful than fire, but I don’t think Garigus much appreciated the kindness I showed him.

But seriously, how could Jaime ever have found any of this pesky wildfire?

[aceluby]

"That Heros don't always win and the bad guy triumphs more often then not"

That's not what's realistic. What's realistic is that nobody is a 'good guy' and very few people are a 'bad guy'. Bad decisions typically lead to bad results, but some people are luckier than others and don't pay for all their bad decisions. That's the realism, not that the bad guy triumphs more often than not.

[danm_999]

Yeah, I do like Jaime but that is a tough one to argue against. There really is no excuse for that.

Indeed.

[danm_999]

Tywin can lie.

Tywin mislikes scheming!

[TheMysteriousOne]

<snip>

This entire post.

[LordStoneheart]

Hmm, I sense the Jaime hate is strong in this one.

Actually, I don't dislike his character since coming on the forums. (Didn't you see my suggestion of Jaime and the Lannisters as a band name?) I just don't overpraise him. I recognize that Jaime did a good thing by slaying Aerys, but I don't hail it as a grandiose heroic act as he was just as in danger as everyone else. I've also said that we only hear Jaime's side, which could be inaccurate to his memory. Not saying he's a liar, but it was a long time ago and he'd be eager to tell it more sympathetic to himself, and he could believe it all.

My main point is that Jaime didn't have time to flee KL when he slew Rossart and the king had he just ran (by his account the whole city would've been leveled. The only way I see him making it out alive is swimming in the blackwater, and thats pretty risky, we know from BotBW. Odds are, he would've been killed.

I'm sure the Lannister soldiers' deaths would've been on his mind too. I'm not sure exactly where I suggested Lannister solider deaths are unimportant, but I never meant to. I was just saying that they could have been a factor in Jaime's decision. Its not that I meant to say that saving Lannister soldiers is less heroic than regular citizens (disregarding the fact that they were sacking the city, raping, killing infants and such...), I'm saying that since Lannister soldiers are there his motivation was more for them than for the regular citizens, but that was there too... just toned down on the heroic since his "family loyalty" soldiers were there and he was there. Another point was that hunting down the other pyromancers isn't as heroic since by his own words they had days to level the city.

All in all, I don't think him saving KL is quite as selfless as people make it out to be, but still a good thing.

[NorthRemembers10]

I feel that it is pretty real because just like life there are moments that are unfair, sad, happy, moments that make you cry and monents that make you fist bump. I think that GRRM does a pretty good job of capturing as much of it as he can in his books.

[Ser Greg of House House]

That Heros don't always win and the bad guy triumphs more often then not, which is fine, but Heros do sometimes win and sometimes miracles happen and the good guy gets out of a suicidal situation. Life does have fist pumping moments where the good guy wins, not often, but sometimes. This series just seems like bad things after another just happen with nothing miraculously good happening. So in that aspect this series lacks realism.

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

[Nephenee]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Yeah, however would Jaime ever find any of the caches? It's not like he wasn't there, and distinctly mentions remembering, the location of them.

And dang, suppose he somehow forgot everything he seems to have remembered 17 years after the fact, it's not like he had ample opportunity to interrogate several alchemists who were in on it;

But seriously, how could Jaime ever have found any of this pesky wildfire?

First off, there's no evidence that Jaime actually looked at those maps, or that he could've looked at them.

Secondly, the only one of two for certain that you mentioned, that wasn't vague has already been found.

A large amount of the stock made for Aerys is still missing, and some still turns up from time to time, including a cache of two hundred jars discovered the year before under the Great Sept of Baelor that no one could recall having been placed there

Excellent. This is where your entire argument collapses. They found a wildfire cache, but they still won't believe Jaime!

It's insane. It's insane how almost everyone hates Jaime both in the book series and on this forum.

[The Wolves]

I feel that it is pretty real because just like life there are moments that are unfair, sad, happy, moments that make you cry and monents that make you fist bump. I think that GRRM does a pretty good job of capturing as much of it as he can in his books.

I sometimes think that GRRM shows it too much. These books doesn't have good things to say about humanity.

[Groat]

snip

I hear what your saying, but Jaime is not a craven, whatever else he may be. I just don't like the idea of him slaying Aerys to save his own skin. That's like saying the pilot who lands a crashing airplane and saves the lives of everyone on board only did it because his own personal life was at stake. Yes, I'm sure the fact that the pilot, personally, was about to die, but that shouldn't take away from the fact that he still saved all those lives.

The act itself may not have been this selfless grandiose act of heroic altruism, I agree. He killed a bunch of people after all, so it was a grisly affair regardless. I just have a lot of respect for him because he takes all the "Kingslayer" and "Oathbreaker" and "Lannisters have shit for honor" all with this stiff upper lip, when even you agree slaying Aerys was a good thing. I agree that not telling anyone about the caches was irresponsible, but him just never explaining himself, to anyone, really garners a lot of respect from me, and I'm not sure why.

Also, the caches of wildfire are more a plot devise, and Jaime is kind of thrown under the bus on this one. He didn't tell anyone about them because he's the rash, not too smart, Jaime. I wouldn't call it a particulalrly horrendous act personally.

[Jon of the Dead]

I think it gets counted as realistic because of moments like Ned's beheading. Ned was presented as being the protagonist up to this point, and most authors would have conjured up some miraculous deus ex machina to save him at the last minute. GRRM has his literary/dramatic reasons for doing this; he thinks it makes the reader more emotionally involved with the other characters to not know which of them are wearing the 'plot armour.' But does it make it a more realistic book overall? I don't think so. In that case it's not very realistic to think that Ned would have been so completely naive about what Cersei was capable of, or not know what a psychotic Joffrey was (especially after the 'butcher's boy' incident,) so it ends up being six of one, a half dozen of the other. Sometimes I think GRRM goes out of his way to create an unrealistic situation just in order to set up these 'realistic' moments like Ned's demise or the Red Wedding.

Like any author GRRM has his strengths and his weaknesses. I think his 'gardening' approach is a serious weakness on a project as big as this, and that's evidenced in how large it has become and how long it's taking to complete. And YES - Martin is bad with timelines, because he didn't create an architectural framework at the beginning to hang his events on.

:agree:

Most of the times character's outcomes are realistic because there's no deus ex machina appearing at the last minute to help them. But sometimes the way GRRM gets characters to this outcomes is unrealistic because characters make choices that make no sense and are even out of character, like Robb marrying Jeyne, most of Dany's and Cersei's decisions in aFfC and aDwD. And then people try to justify these decisitions with things like "Robb and Dany are too young, they are bound to make stupid decisions" or "Cersei has to do that because of the prophecy".

Well, no, in aGoT Robb was a perfectly good military strategist, in a SoS Dany was pretty smart when dealing when her enemies, in the 1st 3 books there's not even a hint of that prophecy. So yeah, outcomes can be realistic but the way GRRM leads characters towards them can be a little too convenient.

[Cruella]

My view is that I don't think Jaime changed that much. Sure, he's upset with Cersei and he grew up a little - spending all this time chained up would do it to you. He always had some good sides.

It's just that Brienne got onto his good side, and when you're one of few people he cares about you're in luck - he'll jump into bearpit for you! he'll kill a kid for you! But if not, well, you better hope you're not on Cersei/Brienne/his own BAD side.

[Littlefingers In The Air]

I think the balance between good and evil this series presents is what's most intriguing. Comeuppance is realistic in this series. It almost never happens where a person who was wronged gets revenge on the specific person(s) who wronged them. A perfect example is Joffrey.

Joffrey abused Sansa Stark. He lied on Arya Stark. He saw to it that small folk were killed. And yet, his death came at the hands of Littlefinger and Olenna Tyrell.

[danm_999]

First off, there's no evidence that Jaime actually looked at those maps, or that he could've looked at them.

Oh sure, except that, in his second quote he gives precise locations for all the caches he saw on the maps and heard Aerys and Rossart talk about.

Geez, really trying to stick your head in the sand on this one. Also, supposing Jaime was struck deaf, dumb and blind at all the meetings he describes as having heard "all" at (I guess when Jaime says "all" he means something different than what "all" actually means, and for some reason it means not including the actual wildfire cache locations, or probably the single most important thing being discussed between Aerys and his pyromaners), you've still not told us why interrogating the alchemists post sack who he knew were present for these meetings was not an option.

The opportunities for Jaime to prove his credibility were so numerous and so laughingly easy it's astonishing you're trying to deny them.

Excellent. This is where your entire argument collapses. They found a wildfire cache, but they still won't believe Jaime!

Err, because there's nothing to believe! Are you kidding me with this shit?

He never told anybody about the Wildfire! And my 'entire' argument is that if Jaime had told people Aerys planned to burn the city with wildfire, he would have been vindicated the second some was found.

And you say that argument falls apart because...nobody believed Jaime about the wildfire he didn't ever mention? Rethink your arguments.

And the one time he DOES tell someone about the wildfire (Brienne) she almost immediately:

A ) Believes him; and

B ) Asks why the hell he never told anyone else.

And with Brienne, he had no physical evidence, no potential witnesses and a decade plus reputation as an oath breaker (not to mention the stuff Brienne heard him confess in the dungeons if Riverrun: Bran's defenestration, twincest).

It's insane. It's insane how almost everyone hates Jaime both in the book series and on this forum.

They don't. It's just most of us aren't into whitewashing. I actually find Jaime entertaining and compelling as a character, but a moral sewer.