Gendry and Jon becoming folk-heroes for bastards?

[LordPathera]

The Blackfyre Rebellions along with a Targaryean King's other Great Bastards seem to be the biggest examples of why bastards are bad in Westeros. Hence the reason why many nobles balk at the idea of legitimizing a bastard even when they have no trueborn children to succeed them with the key exception of Roose Bolton.

Even the righteous and honorable Ned Stark apparently never arranged for Jon to be legitimized even though he's best friends with the King of Westeros (Ignoring R+L=J for the moment). Even Cat would sooner have a distant cousin as Rob's heir than Jon even though Jon has never done anything to justify her vehement hatred apart from being born and looking like a Stark. Ned never even considers convincing Robert to legitimize Gendry or any of his bastards so that the throne won't go to a bastard born of twincest.

So it would be fairly ironic if Gendry and Jon end up being remembered amongst the most heroic and noble heroes/leaders/kings/etc despite their baseborn status. Then future generations of Westeros would have remarkably positive examples of bastards that may weaken the stigma that bastardry carries in this society.

Granted, we'd have to consider Ramsey as well. But the Boltons are traitors who will be remembered as the House that nobody likes or will ever trust, so Ramsey may be grouped with his family.

[Fat Mac]

I think it's possible to set up all of Roberts important bastards (Gendry, Edric, Mya) as an antithesis to Aegon IV's bastards. Make them a great force in ushering in peace and whatnot. That would be interesting to see happen.