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goodqueenaly · 2 years

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Fathers and Sons

Introduction

Toward the beginning of “The Mystery Knight”, Daemon Blackfyre the Younger (poorly disguised as “Ser John the Fiddler”) invites Dunk and Egg to the wedding of Lord Ambrose Butterwell and his young Frey bride. This is a marriage of dynastic necessity: as Bloodraven (rather better disguised as “Maynard Plumm”) will go on to explain to Dunk, since Lord Butterwell lost a son on each side of the Redgrass Field and another to the Great Spring Sickness, “[u]nless this new wife gives him a son, Butterwell's name will die with him”. Of course, what Dunk and Egg come to realize is that this wedding is itself a cover for a far more elaborate scheme - the acclamation of the eldest (surviving) son of the late Daemon Blackfyre as a new, would-be Blackfyre king.

Fittingly, then, throughout the story, the author explores the theme of fathers and sons. In Daemon the Younger, Glendon Flowers, Egg, Dunk, and even the toddler Walder Frey, the author asks readers to consider what paternal influences shape the lives of their sons, and what characteristics in turn mark a son as a worthy successor of his father. Though virtually none of the fathers are physically present in the stories, their characters and identities linger in the persons of their sons, in their personalities, ambitions, motivations, and choices (immediately or in those to come).

Daemon Blackfyre the Elder and Daemon Blackfyre the Younger

Perhaps the most important father-son connection, for the character of the son at least, is that between Daemon “the Younger” Blackfyre and Daemon Blackfyre the elder, first of the Blackfyre claimants to the Iron Throne. Daemon himself teases his long-dead father in his very first appearance in the story; when he meets Dunk on the road to Whitewalls, the disguised Daemon laments that “[m]ine own sire was taken from me too soon”. Likewise, even before Daemon reveals his true identity, the story suggests that his paternity (and specifically paternity, given the patriarchal nature of Westeros) gives him high social standing: despite ostensibly being only a hedge knight, the disguised Daemon is seated on the dais at the wedding feast, alongside Lord Butterwell, the Freys, and the better-born of the aristocratic attendees. Too, once Daemon’s true identity is revealed, the father-son connection is strengthened: Dunk not only realizes that the young man was named “Daemon, after his father”, but he observes that Daemon wears “[p]urple, to bring out the color of his eyes” and has hair that “flow[s] down to his collar in a cascade of silver and gold that glimmered like beaten metal in the torchlight” - that is, a mirror to Daemon the Elder, with his “deep purple eyes” and hair worn “long, flowing down to his shoulders in a silvery-gold mane”.

Yet as Lord Butterwell emphasizes at the end of the story to Dunk, Daemon the Younger “does not bear the sword! If he were his father's son, Bittersteel would have armed him with Blackfyre” (emphasis in the original). The possession of Blackfyre the sword did not just lend Daemon’s dynasty its name, but also represented the legal background by which that dynasty both initially claimed the Iron Throne and continues to do so in this story. Young Glendon summarizes the Blackfyre political argument early in “The Mystery Knight”, explaining that “[t]he old king gave him the sword” (Glendon’s emphasis) because Aegon IV “saw the worthiness in Daemon” and “meant for him to have the kingdom too”. The phallic overtones of the great sword accompany the political uncertainty of its absence at the Whitewalls tourney: in refusing to pass the sword on to Daemon the Younger, Bittersteel in a sense has broken the dynastic line between father and son, denying Daemon the the sort of symbolic paternity which could verify his right to inherit his father’s legacy.

This ruptured and surface-only similarity between Daemon the Elder and Daemon the Younger in turn proves a major detriment to the latter in his ambitions. As the eldest-surviving son of Daemon Blackfyre, young Daemon is the expected, indeed mandated successor to his father’s royal claims. Even before Dunk and Egg meet Daemon, Dunk recalls the executed hunchback septon, who had urged Westerosi to support “our true king across the water” and specifically pointed out that “the Black Dragon [had] sired seven sons”; the paternal translates to the political in Daemon the Younger, first of the (remaining) sons of the dead Daemon Blackfyre. Yet so comically bungled is the conspiracy at Whitewalls - including by Daemon the Younger himself - that his attempts to imitate his father become almost parodic in nature. While Daemon the Younger grandly declares that he will “settle this as my father would” in facing Glendon Flowers in a trial by combat, Daemon proceeds to tumble, defeated, into the mud before being quickly and sarcastically dubbed the “Brown Dragon” - a mockery of his father’s identity as the “Black Dragon”. When Daemon declares that he and his followers will “slash through them [i.e. Bloodraven’s forces] and ride hell-bent for King's Landing” as they “make another Redgrass Field today” - a recollection of Daemon the Elder’s strategy at the Redgrass Field, to vanquish the loyalist forces and take the capital - the attendees at Whitewalls “[mutter] quietly to one another, and … beg[i]n to slink away”. When young Daemon “challenge[s] Lord Bloodraven to single combat” and declares that he will “fight you, or the coward Aerys, or any champion you care to name” - just as Daemon the Elder at the Redgrass Field had dueled the Kingsguard knight Gwayne Corbray in a sort of single combat before being struck down by Bloodraven - the latter simply has him prosaically, and so humiliatingly, arrested.

So while Daemon the Younger may have the outward appearance of Daemon Blackfyre, he is not, in fact, “his father’s son”. Not for Daemon the Younger are his father’s easy charm or impressive aura of martial ability, the popular conception as “the greatest knight of his day” that made the father a natural rallying point for discontent against Daeron II’s government. Daemon the Younger has only dreams - not only the prophetic dreams of his Valyrian inheritance, but also the posthumous dynastic dreams of his father to sit the Iron Throne himself and establish a new royal dynasty. In trying to manifest the former into reality to fulfill the latter, Daemon the Younger does neither; as he is the appearance of Daemon the Elder without the reality, so his uprising is a Blackfyre Rebellion in name, and nowhere near in scale to his father’s.

Quentyn Ball and Glendon Flowers

From the first, Glendon Flowers’ connection to the famous “Fireball” of Blackfyre lore appears tenuous at best and impossible at worst. Brown-haired where Fireball had been so famous for his red hair, and almost too young to be even a posthumous son of Ball - Dunk is surprised at Glendon’s knightly status given his clear youth, while Kyle questions how it could be possible that such a young person as Glendon could be the son of a man who died some 16 years prior - Glendon in his appearance leaves little to corroborate the story of his paternity, no matter how adamant he himself is about it. Uthor Underleaf, who provides the most detail on Glendon’s background, emphasizes the unlikelihood (at least in his opinion) that Quentyn Ball could have been Glendon’s father: as Uthor relates it, Glendon’s mother had earned the derogatory designation “Redgrass Jenny” because “[t]he night before the battle, she fucked so many men”; since “a hundred other men” besides Fireball had had sex with her that night, and since Glendon “does not even have red hair”, it is clearly impossible, from Uthor’s point of view, that Glendon can seriously claim to be Ball’s biological son.

Nor do many others at the tourney wish to acknowledge Glendon as the son of Quentyn Ball. Lord Costayne tells Glendon after the latter’s victory that Glendon “had no right to put a fireball upon [his] shield”, but rather that “[his] device should be a clump of pussywillows”, in mocking honor of his sex worker mother and the brothel where he was raised. Mortimer Boggs, another victim of Glendon’s skill at the joust, calls him a “whore’s bastard” in refusing to pay his loser’s due; likewise, after his own loss to Glendon, Alyn Cockshaw declares that “[t]hat wretched pimpled creature is no son of Quentyn Ball”. Nor is this sense of dismissal limited to the aristocrats present: Lord Butterwell’s steward sneers at young Glendon that “Fireball never had a son”, and the understeward answers Glendon’s demand - “Do you know who my father was?” - with a coolly sarcastic and dismissive reply: “[a] noble knight and mighty lord, I have no doubt … but the same is true of many here”. Even those who grant Glendon’s ancestral assertions do so with some reservations: Kyle the Cat, with hesitant courtesy, introduces him as “Ser Glendon, ah, Ball”, while Daemon the Younger calls him a “son of Fireball” to his face but refers to him as “Fireball’s bastard” later.

Yet young Glendon stubbornly clings to his claimed paternity, and specifically the identification of himself as “Glendon Ball”, a legitimate son of Ser Quentyn: at the wedding feast he wears a doublet with “the red chevron and white plates of House Ball sewn across the chest”, during the tourney his shield displays “his father’s fiery sigil” (in a world where “[b]y law, only a trueborn son is entitled to inherit a knight's arms”), and he snaps at the tourney herald that “I am Glendon Ball, not Glendon Flowers” (the emphasis Glendon’s). The story never really explores what drove Glendon to claim legitimacy, especially when it seems implausible - no one in the story ever suggests that Quentyn and Jenny married, and an aristocratic man who had dismissed his own (presumably aristocratic) wife to leave himself free for the Kingsguard seems unlikely to have then made a marriage with a presumably lowborn camp follower - though a few clues may hint at his reasoning. That Glendon wishes to romanticize his unsavory upbringing is clear: in recounting his childhood riding experience, Glendon refers to “the ... [sic] the inn where I was raised”, a euphemistic designation for his mother’s brothel. If Uthor’s note that “the other whores took care of them [i.e. Glendon and his sister] and fed the lad the tale his mother had concocted, about him being Fireball's seed”, then perhaps the tale grew from Jenny and Fireball having sex to Jenny and Fireball secretly and tragically marrying on the eve of his death. Hearing this story, and idealizing his environment, Glendon may have wanted to believe that there was more to his life than being the son of a sex worker: he was, so he could think, the heir - in blood as well as in spirit - to one of the greatest of the Blackfyres’ “noble company” and “roll of heroes”.

The question of Glendon’s legitimacy aside, however, the story still suggests that Glendon could in fact be Quentyn Ball’s son. One of Quentyn’s defining characteristics, after all, was his “hot head”, a trait certainly shared by young Glendon: he vehemently argues for the Blackfyre cause even after Kyle and Dunk attempt some conciliation (while honing a sword, as if ready for violence), reaches for his sword when Butterwell’s steward denies his claim to the Ball legacy (and looks “ready to kill someone” when Kirby Pimm quietly jokes about the circumstances of Glendon’s knighthood), and becomes offended Dunk’s well-meaning offer to accompany him and Egg to Winterfell, assuming that Dunk is “telling [him he] need[s] to run away and hide”. At the same time, however, Quentyn Ball is popularly remembered for a certain sense of chivalry: Egg informs Dunk that “[Fireball] cut down the sons of Lady Penrose one by one” but “spared the life of the youngest one as a kindness to his mother”, an act that Dunk “[has] to admit” was “chivalrous of him”. Glendon, too, acknowledges the requirements of chivalry, despite his fiery temper: he not only refuses the dishonorable act of intentionally losing to Daemon, but also apologizes to Dunk after acting suspicious of Dunk’s offer, noting that “[a] knight must needs be courteous” (and it may be no coincidence that it is Glendon’s mother who taught him this lesson, who per Uthor’s assertion encouraged Glendon to believe he was Fireball’s son; in that sense, Glendon’s assumed biological inheritance goes hand in hand with his chivalric inheritance - that Glendon must be a true knight, just as his father had been, at least in wistful Blackfyre remembrance). Of course, Quentyn Ball could afford a sense of chivalry in the midst of likely plenty of wartime atrocity, given his apparently considerable martial talents: not only had he trained the royal princes and the Great Bastards at arms (a considerable feat, given the prowess of Baelor, Maekar, and Daemon), but Fireball also “killed Lord Lefford at the gates of Lannisport and sent the Grey Lion running back to hide inside the Rock”. Glendon is likewise no slouch of a knight: despite having very little in the way of formal training, and none from an anointed knight, Glendon has combined probably considerable natural talent with regular horse riding experience to become a very successful jouster even at a relatively very young age.

So while many might question the biological, and consequently dynastic, paternity and legitimacy of Glendon - born the child of a known sex worker, with no physical resemblance to Quentyn Ball - Glendon himself actually becomes the better version of his would-be father. As Ser Quentyn had been a very martially capable man, so Glendon shows himself precociously talented as a young knight - yet where Ser Quentyn had served an unjust cause rooted in falsehood, racism, and xenophobia, Glendon behaves as a true knight, both for himself and toward Dunk. Indeed, Glendon prioritizes his personal commitment to knighthood above his ostensible paternal allegiance to the Blackfyre cause: as Glendon tells Dunk with respect to Daemon the Younger and the Blackfyres, “My father died for him. I would have been his man, and gladly. I would have fought for him, killed for him, died for him, but I could not lose for him”. Glendon is truly Quentyn Ball’s heir in spirit, if not, perhaps, in blood and law; he can succeed where his father failed, choosing an honorable knighthood over dishonorable Blackfyre service. (One may hope that Dunk’s rueful prediction about himself and Glendon - that “[y]ou have as much chance of wearing a white cloak as I do” - will allow Glendon to complete his filial evolution, giving him “the white cloak that he [i.e. Ser Quentyn] never got to wear” but in the service of a just and noble king.)

Maekar Targaryen and Egg

From the very beginning of “The Mystery Knight”, the story underlines how Maekar’s perspectives directly influence Egg’s opinions. After Dunk asks Egg for details on Lord Butterwell, Egg declares (having “made a face” at the idea that Maekar and Butterwell were friends) that “[m]y father never liked him” because Butterwell sent a son to both the Blackfyre and Targaryen hosts while not choosing to fight himself; moreover, when Dunk observes that “[s]ome might call that prudent”, Egg promptly replies that “[m]y father calls it craven.” Likewise, when Dunk looks to Egg for background on Quentyn Ball, it is Maekar that Egg cites as part of his review: not only had Fireball “taught my father and my uncles how to fight”, but Egg adds that “[m]y father says that it was Fireball as much as Bittersteel who convinced Daemon Blackfyre to claim the crown, and rescued him when Daeron sent the Kingsguard to arrest him”. Later, Egg perfectly (if somewhat shamefacedly, given the context) repeats to Dunk the list of rules Maekar had given him, Egg, to follow after Maekar had agreed to let him become Dunk’s squire. Unseen since “The Hedge Knight”, out of his son’s life for the better part of two years at this point, Maekar is nevertheless a formative and dominant presence in Egg’s thoughts.

Egg’s admiration of his father and eagerness to come to his defense are not without immediate consequences, however. While Egg holds his tongue as Kyle the Cat rhetorically asks “What do the Targaryens do?” and opines that “Prince Maekar broods at Summerhall”, he refuses to remain silent when Kyle suggests that Prince Rhaegal and his twins might be killed by “Maekar’s mace”; instead, Egg “sp[eaks] up shrill and loud”, declaring that “Prince Maekar is Prince Rhaegel’s brother” (Egg’s own emphasis) who “loves him well” and would “never do harm to him or his”. While Dunk is quick to verbally reprimand Egg for defending Maekar (the better to maintain the former’s disguise), he is powerless to intervene when Egg later stands up for his father again. As Egg recounts to Dunk afterward, during the squires’ wedding feast, some of the other squires “called my father a kinslayer” (the emphasis again Egg’s); Egg then, so he relates, insisted that “Prince Baelor’s death was just a mishap” and that “Prince Maekar loved his brother Baelor”. That Egg would not stop at words to defend his father is evident, as Dunk discovers from Egg’s broken lip: at hearing the other squires’ jeering comments that Maekar had “loved him [i.e. Baelor] to death” and “meant to love his brother Aerys the same way”, Egg “hit him [i.e. Mallor, one of the other squires] … hit him good” - resulting, of course, in Egg receiving a blow in return. Egg demonstrates a filial devotion to Maekar at once commendable and reckless: if within the royal crèche such familial loyalty might be no less than expected (as Egg honors his father, so Maekar has honored his own father and then his elder brothers, each dutifully serving the dynasty), in the wider world the disguised Egg has no royal privilege or personal explanation to justify his loyalty in a turbulent political climate.

Yet Egg’s desire to imitate his father ultimately proves key to his schemes against the Blackfyre conspiracy at Whitewalls (even if these schemes were not quite intended to be as much). When Egg recounts his intimidation of Lords Butterwell and Frey to Dunk, he notes that “I remembered this one time I heard my father talking about something Lord Bloodraven said, about how it was better to be frightening than frightened”; even secondhand, Maekar’s words inspire Egg’s actions. Maekar more directly impacts Egg’s decision-making thereafter, as Egg seizes upon the person of his father to undercut the nascent conspiracy: as Egg relates that “I told them that my father had sent us here to spy for him, that he was on his way here with an army, that His Lordship had best release me and give up this treason, or it would mean his head”, he wryly smiles that “[i]t worked better than I thought it would” - hardly surprising, when Maekar had been one half of the victorious Targaryen force at the Redgrass Field and a tough (if also brooding and absent) authority figure within the royal dynasty. Even Egg’s acting as Dunk enters the Whitewalls sept borrows from Maekar’s personality: Dunk thinks that Egg “sounds more angry than afraid, and I have never seen him look so stern”, echoing descriptions of Maekar as “a harsh man, quick to judge and to condemn”. It is his father to whom Egg looks for example when he needs to cow the local powers at Whitewalls, and his father’s reputation which allows him to succeed in this ventury.

So even though Egg’s use of Maekar’s name and character does not personally foil the Blackfyre conspiracy at Whitewalls (at least not nearly as much as Bloodraven’s own actions do), it is his adoption of his father’s identity and underlining of his relationship with his father which marks the symbolic “hatching” of the dragon egg that Daemon Blackfyre the Younger foresaw. When Egg stands by Bloodraven at the end of the story, he openly wears his father’s ring on his hand; no longer hiding his connection to Maekar, Egg now proudly advertises that he is his father’s son, the rightful inheritor of his authority as embodied in his signet ring with his personal seal. Egg feels newly confident enough to give even the Hand of the King orders, and when questioned by that Hand who he, Egg, to do so, Egg reminds Bloodraven that “[y]ou know who I am, cousin” - that is, the son of Prince Maekar, a prince in his own right, clearly designated with a level of authority through the gift of Maekar’s ring. Egg also speaks on Maekar’s behalf against Bloodraven: when the latter indirectly threatens to seize Egg as a hostage, Egg retorts that “[m]y father would not take kindly to that”, a response with which Bloodraven reluctantly agrees. Egg is his father’s son, the one who not only absorbs his father’s opinions but also acts in his name and, in the end, takes pride in his relationship to his father.

Ser Arlan of Pennytree and Dunk

Of all the fathers and son relationships explored in “The Mystery Knight”, Dunk and Ser Arlan are the only pair with definitely no biological connection (even young Glendon has the possibility, however remote, to have been sired by Quentyn Ball). Yet in no way should this lack of biological paternity undermine the relationship, for the story underscores time and again how paternally Arlan had treated his onetime squire. Arlan’s teasing, fond rather than malicious, gets quoted by Dunk - that “he [i.e. Dunk] never used that [i.e. his head] anyway”, and that his, Dunk’s, head was “as hard as stone”. Dunk consistently remembers Arlan’s advice to him as well: Arlan’s epigram that “peasant’s pride is lordling’s shame”, his reminder to face “[o]ne foe at a time”, his observation on the North as “a world all its own”. Ser Arlan had also shared personal memories with Dunk during their time together, from his viewing of the last dragon’s eggs to his praise of the local inn’s fine ale.

More immediately, for “The Mystery Knight”, one of those personal memories of Arlan’s returns in a painful way. When Dunk learns that the arrogant lord met on the road was Gormon Peake, he remembers that Arlan had “told me how his sister's son had died’”, and that “‘[Roger’s] head was smashed in by a mace wielded by a lord with three castles on his shield’”. That this memory had deeply, negatively affected Arlan is evident: Dunk remarks that Arlan had only revealed this incident “in his cups”, and recalls “the wine on his breath” at the time; alcohol both loosed this guarded trauma for Arlan and, perhaps, had helped repress it in the intervening years. Likewise, Dunk thinks that “[t]he old man never knew his [i.e. Gormon Peake’s] name. Or never wanted to”, and despite Dunk’s internal assertion that “it has nought to do with me”, he falls into an awkward silence afterward; what had once hurt Arlan remains to trouble Dunk. Nor does Dunk himself easily forget this memory: when he and Egg arrive at the inn, he asks if Lord Peake is staying there too, while adding (albeit silently) “[h]e killed Ser. Arlan's squire”.

Indeed, throughout the story Dunk recognizes the close (if artificial) bond that had arisen between himself and Arlan during his squiring service. As Dunk thinks, Arlan “had saved him” from a life of thievery and begging in King’s Landing by installing him as his squire, placing him in the same position his own blood relative Roger had once enjoyed. In first being allowed to handle Arlan’s sword, Dunk had developed his dream of joining the Kingsguard; this sword, the weapon of a knight, had shown him the possibility not just of knighthood but the greatest (from an idealistic Westerosi perspective) knightly career possible. Thus comes Dunk’s sad realization, upon waking from his failed tilt, that “I have lost the old man's sword”, now required to be turned over to the victor. If Blackfyre, the sword, symbolized the paternal (as well as political) connection between the founder of the would-be Blackfyre dynasty and its new inheritor, Daemon the Younger, the much humbler sword of Ser Arlan represented the gift of arms Arlan had (albeit posthumously, and so unconsciously) passed on to Dunk as the culmination of their relationship, the knightly inheritance Arlan had likely intended, if never formally presented. In turn, as Blackfyre’s absence from the tourney severed the politco-paternal bond between Daemon Blackfyre and Daemon the Younger, so Dunk’s loss of Arlan’s sword seems to him, Dunk, the end of that chivalic-paternal link between Arlan and Dunk.

In this context of invented (if no less meaningful) filial care and paternal pain, Dunk initially seeks to redeem his father-figure Arlan through the defeat of that same Lord Peake. Befitting Dunk’s chivalric (as well as personal) connection to Arlan, Dunk dreams of doing so in the context of the upcoming tourney: he “pictur[es] himself atop Thunder, riding down that sour-faced old lord with the three castles on his shield” and imagines telling Peake that “[i]t was old Ser Arlan's squire who defeated you … the boy who replaced the boy you killed”. Dunk specifically cherishes this dream because “[t]he old man would like that”, a reflection of the love still felt for Arlan by his de facto son. Of course, Dunk does not unhorse Lord Peake, nor does he contribute in any but the most indirect way toward his death; he can only observe Peake’s head, collected by the victorious Bloodraven in the aftermath of the abortive rebellion, as that of “[t]he man who slew Roger of Pennytree”. Moreover, and perhaps surprisingly given that initial dream, in the end, Dunk grants Lord Peake’s decapitated head the small respect of closing its eyes; since “[i]f Roger had not died that day, the old man would never have looked twice at Dunk”, Lord Peake deserves this minor, posthumous tribute. For Dunk, the act that had caused Arlan so much pain becomes (at least in the comfort of a post-Gormon world) a sort of necessary sin which had brought him so beloved a father-figure; he cannot revive “poor Roger” from the grave Peake made for him, but he can cherish what he, Dunk, gained from that tragedy - that is, the kindly paternal influence of Ser Arlan.

Lord Frey and Walder Frey

Uniquely among all the father-son pairs examined in “The Mystery Knight”, Lord Frey and young Walder are the only individuals where both father and son are alive and appear together on page. Moreover, even without knowing the younger Frey’s identity (and specifically as it relates to the main novels), the very presence of father and son together at the feast serves as a pointed contrast to Lord Buttewell. While Butterwell has to make a new marriage because of his lack of sons - even settling for a “soiled” girl (so the mindset of patriarchal, misogynistic Westeros sees it) out of his dynastic desperation - Lord Frey can proudly advertise his ability to propagate his dynasty. In the heart of Butterwell power, the rich seat of Whitewalls, Ambrose has only his two daughters, already integrated into other dynasties (and so unable to carry on the Butterwell name); by contrast, Lord Frey boasts not only the continuation of his own line via young Walder, but the insurance of the Frey dynasty through its other, specifically male members (his brother Ser Franklyn, an unnamed nephew, and - albeit perhaps the same person - Ser Addam Frey, a cousin to the lord’s daughter).

More specifically, of course, Lord Frey’s conduct at this wedding provides fitting lessons for his son, the future Lord Walder. With Butterwell having brought his two daughters and their lordly husbands to his wedding, Lord Frey matches him with his daughters and their (presumably noble, if not necessarily lordly) husbands; it is a move which recalls - and indeed in this context, foreshadows - Walder’s gleeful declaration, much later, that he could match both Catelyn Stark and Tywin Lannister “son for son” and still be able to name his progeny when theirs had all died. Lord Frey’s interest in ridding himself of his “somewhat soiled daughter” likwise recalls Walder’s informing Catelyn that in seeking a marriage between his family and Edmure “what I wanted was to get rid of a daughter” (and indeed, Walder’s own son Merrett would later feel he had to marry off his eldest daughter Amerei to “a bloody hedge knight” because she was a “slut” who had been “caught in the stables with no fewer than three grooms”). Even Lord Frey’s jovial encouragement of his daughter’s upcoming marital relations finds an echo in Walder’s insistence that Edmure and Roslin be put to bed at the end of their wedding feast; Westeros’ dynastic sexual forms must be observed, even where the fathers know (or at the very least, as in the case of the elder Lord Frey, have reason to suspect) that the alliances sealed by those forms will mean little and less in the immediate future.

On a larger scale, the Second Blackfyre Rebellion serves as a key moment of paternal education from one Frey to the other, in which Lord Frey would teach his heir (or, at the very least, act in a way that his heir might be told of later) how to handle uncertain political situations for the best advantage of House Frey. Lord Frey’s involvement in this conspiracy is from the first careful and self-serving; his motivation is to dispose of a daughter whose nuptial worth in pitilessly patriarchal Westerosi society has diminished significantly, while his public toasts at the feast are at best ambiguous and hedging (nodding to “[t]he king” - not otherwise specified - his daughter and new son-in-law, and that chief Blackfyre enemy, Brynden Rivers). More to the point, when Egg reveals - or, rather, pretends to reveal - that his father is approaching with an army, Frey immediately leaves, ostensibly to return home - except he could not have gone far, because when Bloodraven arrives very soon thereafter, who is to be found relaxing “in a camp chair with a cup of wine to hand and his hideous little heir squirming in his lap”, near to Bloodraven himself, but Lord Frey. The implication seems clear: Lord Frey acted as an informant to Bloodraven, at least when Egg made his (false) revelation and perhaps even earlier, trading his daughter for his own (and, of course, his son’s) dynastic security. If Lord Frey had once believed it would be advantageous to be linked to the host of the nascent uprising in the event of a Blackfyre victory, he had clearly realized at some point that the likelihood of success lay with the crown and not its would-be rival.

These lessons would be practiced in turn by Walder Frey some nine decades later. If the Freys had fought for their ostensible Tully lieges and their new liege, Robb Stark, in the early outset of the War of the Five Kings, they had done so only after wringing considerable political concessions from the Starks - two Frey grandsons to be fostered at Winterfell, a betrothal between a Frey son and a Stark princess, and a Frey maiden to be the Stark queen. Moreover, when the Freys had realized the the Starks seemed a losing cause, they had been quick to communicate with the power on the Iron Throne, seeking (and receiving) a pardon for their betrayal of their sometime royal (but, in the eyes of the Iron Throne, simply traitorous) allies. At another, far bloodier wedding, Walder would trade his own daughter to a doomed lord to cement his family’s preservation; Rosalin’s misery - personal, in knowing that she could do nothing to prevent the imprisonment and slaughter of her new husband and his family, as well as political, in herself living out her days as a lady in name only, within the gilded captivity of Casterly Rock - means no more to Walder than that Frey daughter’s ruin and approaching homelessness means in this story to her father, so long as House Frey survives.

So while young Walder is in the course of “The Mystery Knight” far too young to participate in the game of thrones himself, this story presents him as cut from the very same cloth - presumably embroidered with the twin towers of Frey, gray on blue - as his lord father. Calculation, cultivation of the family dynasty, and an utter lack of empathy for anyone or anything that might threaten the latter are found in both Lord Frey during the course of the story and Walder Frey during the main novels. However, lest this be thought merely a cynical or nihilistic tale of the triumph of the hard-hearted, the author hardly eulogizes the younger Frey: in the viewpoint of our extremely likable and sympathetic POV Dunk, the child Walder is “hideous”, “a chinless boy of four whose nose was dripping snot” with “the most irritating laugh Dunk had ever heard”. The ugliness of the father’s actions - the naked and ruthless ambition to condemn his daughter to political and perhaps literal destitution for the crime of premarital sex - is reflected in the physical ugliness of his male heir; as Lord Frey proves a man willing to sacrifice one family member for the (so he believes) sake of his House, so he is fated to have an heir who will escalate that willingness to such an extreme that the House itself may well be doomed.

#asoiaf meta #the mystery knight #tales of dunk and egg #daemon ii blackfyre #daemon blackfyre #glendon flowers #quentyn ball #maekar i targaryen #aegon v targaryen #duncan the tall #arlan of pennytree #walder frey

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spacehologramcollection · 4 years

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Kombat Krew and Animal Crossing.

It should come as no surprise that I’ve been playing Animal Crossing a lot recently. I’ve got real life debt in terms of my student loans. And also, debt in the game too! What a life I have and what a world we live in. So, here’s a crossover that no one asked for. Kombat Krew reacting to it/ playing it with their S/O and what kind of villager they’d be! I didn’t do everyone, mainly the ones that I think would/could play the game! And This is such a pure post. Wow. No warnings what so ever. But just because of length of post I’ve popped a cut in, just because it’s a little long!

· Cassie Cage; She’s reluctant to play it at first. When you’re both chatting about it and hyping it up, she’s sipping her smoothie raising an eyebrow. But because she’s a supportive partner, she will watch all the trailers in the hype run. She has to admit it does look cute. She’ll buy you it and can’t help but keep peering up and watching as you run around your island, catching bugs and fish. Smiling at the occasional scream as you try and run from a tarantula. “So, you owe the Racoon money? Wait, why are you paying for more extensions on your house?!” Doesn’t understand till she finally bites the bullet and plays it when you’re not in… within an hour she’s bought it and is playing it. Then it’s on. You find her awake at 3 AM, she’s sat crossed legged on the sofa, playing it intently. Cute dates where you go out to a café and local play. Visiting each other’s islands, planting flowers and taking cute aesthetic photos. Her house is full of bright colours and random assortments of bits and pieces she found cute. Johnny takes the piss out of you both. The fact you’re both sat next to each other on the sofa, playing the same game, and speaking gibberish. Cassie is also slightly competitive; she doesn’t know where she gets it from Johnny and Sonya. So, it’s no wonder that she wins the tourneys, does all of the events and completes the nook mile challenges efficiently.

If she was a Villager: A squirrel. Kind of like Blaire. Normal personality.

· Smoke (Tomas Vrbada): If ever there was a game that fit Smokes aesthetic and general vibe it would be Animal Crossing. How he got introduced to the series was that he was reading peacefully. Until your squeal of excitement disrupted him. Honestly, at first, he thought some shit had happened. Queue him evaporating and appearing mid living room. Only to see you’re happy because there was a leaked trailer for a game. His mouth starts out agape, as if questioning, why you would make such a noise over a game. That expression changes when he watches it with you. He loves it so much… is actually excited for the prospect of living a quiet life on his own Island. Pre-orders with you so you both can play it. Smoke also definitely owns a grey switch. He. Loves. This. Game. Stays up late with you playing it the first days it’s released. His islands name will be something fantasy based. His character has great hair too. Loves planting flowers and tending your joint garden on his island. His house is so neat, and each room has a theme. Everything is in place and organised too. He loves also going to the museum with you and having a look at everything. He loves that there’s a museum. He’s pretty much the Lin Kuei Blathers at this point. And you guys can go on virtual dates to the museum and each other’s towns when he’s away on a mission. Loves playing it whilst you’re both snuggled up in bed together. When he finds out that the different hemispheres have different bugs and fish, he begs Bi-Han and Kuai to get it. Because he wants to flesh that museum out! “So, there’s this racoon that you have to pay your debt off too. But it’s addictive and it’s a great distraction…” “TOMAS IT’S 3AM GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP” – Bi-Han. If he was a villager: There’s a hipster bear in it. So yeah. He’s a hipster bear, he’s basically Beardo. If there were owl villagers, I’d have made him an owl! Smug personality on AC is more polite, gentleman like, so it’s actually not a bad personality.

· Kabal: He’s sure he should be doing work right now. But who gives a fuck when he needs to tend to his garden. Virtual chibi Kabal is living his best life right now. Not having to put up with Kano. His boots are on his desk whilst he plays. He honestly remembers playing the original on GameCube. A friend from school had it and he wanted it so badly, but his mom could never afford it. But now he’s an adult, he can literally buy whatever the fuck he wants. When he finds out you love the series too, he cannot help but smile. He tries to let on that he’s not obsessed, but he is. He preloads it and keeps checking to see if you can play it. Queue him staying up till midnight and waking you up to let you know it’s on. By the time you get up properly he’s filling out the museum, has paid off his first loan and is ready for more. He loves playing it with you, will be a bit of a dick at times, and will totally hit you with net or snipe the bug you’re trying to get. Only for him to gift you it. He’s strategically planned this hit. He’s chosen the Southern Hemisphere and has got oranges. He needs everything. It’s cute how obsessed he is with it. When he’s away, he loves playing it with you, visiting each other’s towns, leaving cute notes on the Notice Board and sending letters. Virtual you and him are so cute. “Hey Kabal, what you playin’?” “None of your fucking business.”

If he was a villager: Definitely an Alligator. Just going off the fact he has a tooth. I’m going with Jock personality. Just because he’s a hyper up and can be intense at times. So probably like Sly.

· Frost: She like Cassie pretends not to care about it. Who has time for games? She sure as hell doesn’t… even though it does look cute, and she does miss having a garden. She finds it therapeutic. Not that the temple has a garden because ahaha it’s fucking freezing and always snowing. Frost is literally acts like an ice sculpture, hard and frozen inside and out. In reality, she’s more like a snowman. Soft and squishy. She does have a soft spot for the game… especially when she watches you planting flowers and making a little garden. If you have a full switch and can create multiple characters, she may get a little emotional that you made her and made her a little garden. Okay. Maybe she’ll play it for a few minutes… *Four hours later* She’s giggling wildly as she catches bugs and plants and waters more flowers. At first, she’s content with just playing the character you made her… but then she finds out from Cassie you can play together. And that’s it. She wants to do cute couple shit on it. Buys the game and surprises you when she sits next to you and reluctantly asks what to call her Island. You’ll both lay next to each other playing it together. She’s hyper competitive as well, so she ends up doing all of the tourneys and winning. As well as helping you out if you’re struggling with a certain part. If she was a Villager: She’s definitely a cat villager. Probably like Katt, quirky looking and a bit mean looking. But on the inside really caring and sweet.

· Kuai Liang (Sub Zero): Why is he playing this again? You said you had a great distraction in mind for him. What he did not expect was for him to be sat on your sofa on a rainy day. Holding you switch and staring from it to the TV in mild confusement. He knew that a new game had come out and it had, in a word, consumed every fibre of your being for the past few days. He loved how happy it made you and would often smile fondly watching you play it… but he didn’t expect himself to be playing it. You made him, pretty accurately, on the game and he’s kind of impressed. You do have to walk him through it, because him and technology do not mix. He does get the hang of it and he has the patience of a saint and the accuracy of a pro angler when it comes to catching fish. You’re pretty damn impressed. He hates to admit how much he loves the game. And it’s kind of cute that you’re sort of playing it together. He may round the corner a few times when you’re playing to ask if you’re advancing the island, because he knows he can’t do it… and he would like to visit the museum and add to it. Secretly loves it. Not enough for him to actually play it himself, but he does find himself playing it in a morning before you wake up. Don’t tell Smoke or Bi-Han he won’t hear the end of it. ‘I don’t have time for pop culture’ BULLSHIT KUAI!

If he was a villager: A Penguin. fucking fight, me on this. He’d probably look like Roald but with a smug personality. Remember Smug is good in this game, I know mind fuck.

· Bi-Han: Okay so the colours hurt his head. They are so bright. Why is that eagle wearing a blazer? What the fuck is going on. If you thought Kuai was confused Bi-Han is next level confused… but he also wants a go. He really wants to play it. He likes to get involved with what you like, and if playing this Mutli-coloured game about living on an island makes you happy, then so be it! Will start off with a character on your save. Before progressing to him eventually getting it himself and ‘borrowing’ the hidden Switch that Smoke has. The one he hides at the bottom of his sock draw, next to his diary, to the left of embarrassing photos of him. You’ll find him playing in between meditation and training. He secretly loves it. He gets a system going and soon has overtaken you on it. Invites you around to show off his pad. Which is a mess, just like his actual room. But it’s got the Bi-Han charm. Totally moves his house to a ledge so no one can visit him. Will play it secretly, pretending to be busy but actually just vibing on a tree stump catching bugs. He loves visiting your island. He’ll change your flowers around, and plant fruit trees for you. He’ll also leave you small presents in your house. He gets into it, but he just likes been able to share a bit of your world. He didn’t have videogames growing up, so it’s nice to finally be exposed to a bit of pop culture.

If he was a villager: He’d be a bear with a jock personality. Would probably look something similar to either Curt or Groucho.

· Jacqui: She’s excited to play this. She remembers playing it when she was younger. Confused the fuck out of her dad. They had a real farm, but she wanted to virtually take care of her plants and trees. Confused him. But when she finds out you love the game too, she’s over the fucking moon. She’s got Cassie to play it with her, but the fact you, her darling S/O love it too makes her so happy! She’s had the same aesthetic and favourite villagers since she was a kid. But she loves all the villagers, she thinks there all quirky and cute in there own way! Her Island is also so organised. She also saved your butt a few times, catching the tarantulas as you ran around madly trying to avoid them. She event split the profit from her trip to tarantula island with you! I’ve always had the HC that Jacqui is artistic, so she makes cute custom designs that look 110% amazing. And has totally made you both matching outfits to wear and take cute photos with. She tried her hardest to make her house into your shared apartment, and to be fair, she did a really great job at it! You and her both lay on the sofa playing it together, laughing and chilling together over takeaway, with a comfy movie on in the background. She loves that you can share this interest and that you can still virtually be together when she’s far away. Will send you letters in game too when she’s away. With stuff she’s picked up and thinks you’ll like or will ok cute in her house. She owns all the shell stuff because it’s so pretty and costal looking. Her house is totally near the beach. She’s always secretly wanted to live near the coast. Jax can’t get his head around that your in her game, and she’s in yours.

If she was a villager: I’d say a wolf villager. Kind of like Audie who’s really peppy and happy go-lucky. Most of her intros are upbeat and can-do attitude like! So, I think it matches her personality really well!

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yamis-ramblings · 3 years

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So, I recently finished Crosscode, and I've bee thinking about doing these little reviews on my tumblr for a while.

So, why not start with Crosscode? This is gonna be a bit rough around the edges but here's my attempt at a mostly spoiler free crosscode review! There'll be spoilers for the first little bit of the game, but nothing else and nothing major.

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Intro

So, Crosscode is a game about an mmo named Crossworlds. This probably sounds stupid off the bat to you, right? Like some more SAO shit? Well you'd be very wrong.

First of all, Crossworlds isn't virtual. It takes place on a distant moon using something called "instant matter". There's a small section of this moon called "the playground", or "the croissant" due to it s shape, that the mmo takes place on. Now, you aren't traveling to this moon to play this game. You have a headset that lets you make an avatar out of instant matter and transports your conciousness into this new body, letting you control it and experience the game from its perspective. You can even turn on certain settings that allows you to feel what it feels.

There are however real flesh and blood people on the moon, but they don't normally enter the playground- at least they're not supposed to. They consist of mantience crews mostly from what we know, and they're the ones keeping the place running. Players however don't see them.

Now, the game isn't simply about this mmo. You're not playing a rpg to play an mmorpg. You've got goals, and you're experiencing a story, an adventure. Relationships and bonds. Throughout the game you'll experience joy and heartbreak, and the game goes into some really clever topics and is full of references and jokes. Its a very clever game, and this mmo setting doesn't hold it back- infact, it takes full advantage of it to tell a story that provides a fresh and progressive look at familiar ideas, ideas about the rules of robotics, freedom of people, anxiety and stress, trauma, and many more.

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Story

The story of Crosscode is very strong. It consists of ten chapters, and the only time it lags behind is chapter 8. However if you maintain your energy for the chapter it has a really large area for you to explore, and in my opinion it had one of the best end bosses out of all the chapters.

That aside, you play as Lea:

She's a smug, sassy, kind, caring, strong, soft, and brilliant protaganist. Oh, and she's mute. Lea's voice module is broken, meaning she can't communicate like other players. She does however become able say seven words throughout the game.

Now, Lea doesn't start out in the Playground. That's because she's not a normal player. Lea's lost her memory, and Crossworlds may be the only way to help her get it back. Lea's not alone in this, infact from the start, Sergey is at your side communicating as a sort of guide, but also companion:

Sergey is the one that believes Crossworld will help Lea regain her memories. Lea'll awaken in a cargo ship a fair bit aways from the Playground, greeted by not only Sergey, but Carla:

Carla is Lea's first friend in the game, and she'll effectively give you your tutorial. But by doing this she's making sure Lea's able to control her avatar and is alright. She's the ships mechanic, she's tough, she's got a sense of humour, and she's lovely. Skip a few minutes forward and you'll be introduced to Captain Jet:

Jet is the captain of the cargo ship, and wary of having an avatar on board. The backround we get for him hints towards an existence of community and civilization outside of these maintenance crews and crossworlds, as he's actually a previous tourney champion using VRP's. I cannot for the life of me remember exactly what that stands for, but to repeat the joke the game makes

Balls

Essentially the captain, and Lea, use instant matter balls as ranged weapons. (Lea also has melee attacks).

The captain will finish your tutorial, and after that some really cool stuff that I won't spoil will happen, and you'll be brought into the tutorial area where you meet three more lovely characters. To save your time however, let's just talk about the best character in the game

I love Emilie. I'm convinced that Lea and Emilie are a crushing on eachother, if not just incredibly good friends, due to the nature of their relationship's growth.

Emilie is spunky, peppy, a little airheaded, and ready to punch anything. She despises bugs, but she loves Lea. She's Lea's best friend, and they'd do anything for each other. Play the game, if only for Lea and Emilie.

You'll encounter a dungeon here that Emilie will race you through (its instanced, so you won't race in person). This will teach you the basics about dungeons.

After this, you're in the playground. Soon you meet a friend of Emilie's, he introduces you to the story, gives you a tour of the first town, and you're off on your own. The girls' dynamic is highlighted right away, and the game is great.

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Gameplay

This is where I get a little mixed. I think the game is excellent, I'm just too stupid. Thankfully the game has various difficulty/accessibility options to help.

The combat of the game is lovely. Its fast, fluid, creative, and the loop is wonderful. The bosses are intuitive and fun, and the fights get very creative in how they involve the elements (you get four elements throughout the game, each with different effects in combat and puzzles) ranged attacks, and melee attacks.

The puzzles are where I struggled. I can't say it struggled, because the puzzles were very smart! I just wasn't. Your ranged attack has a charged mode, where if you wait a second you'll throw a ball that will bounce off walls. This uses physics to do this, and it gets incredibly clever and hard. The puzzles are excellent, I enjoyed a lot of them, I just needed some help because I'm slow

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Music

Absolutely

Amazingly

Beautiful

That is all

#Yami Reviews #Crosscose #RPG #Indie Game #video games

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mattapparentlystumbltourneys · 4 months

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Virtual Character Tourney - FINAL

Propaganda below (May contain spoilers)

Hatsune Miku propaganda:

she is hatsune fucking miku. progenitor of the character vocal series. she is everything

she's literally the OG virtual girl…

first sound of the future and the most iconic #Girl in the world. everybody loves her. liking vocaloid is not a prerequisite to liking miku she is everything to me she is blue hair blue tie hiding in your wifi. And she is my best friend

Hera propaganda:

Shes badass and runs the whole space station because she pretty much is the space station. :)

Truly one of my fave character arcs of all time. Like. Her body is a space station but people can rip out her brain but she wants to kill people but she forgets how fragile human life is but she can find loopholes around any rule you give her but she LOVES her FRIENDS. I'm OBSESSED with her.

She is the AI running an entire space station orbiting around a red dwarf star. She's tried bypassing her programming to keep everyone on the station multiple times just to see if she could (and it ends up saving the day at one point). She also has been programmed with anxiety (basically a glitch that'll pop up that repeats the phrase "I can't do this. I'm not good enough") by her creator and she learns how to get around this. She's picked up sarcasm from one of her human shipmates, she died and came back, she is all around a 10/10. Sorry I just really love Hera

#virtual character tourney #finals #hatsune miku #miku #vocaloid miku #vocaloid #hera wolf 359 #hera #wolf 359 #character polls

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sexiestpodcastcharacter · 4 months

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The Eye Bracket finals will be between The Voice of Night Vale and The Archivist, to nobody's surprise. The Entity and the Hundred Eyes in the Dark fans put up a good fight though, and should be proud.

Finals will be posted whenever I can make the graphics. I am currently bedbound with pain so the timeline is.... nonexistent. Could be in two hours or two weeks (probably not two weeks but Christmas and New Year's and visiting family and I'm supposed to visit family but that's kinda hard to do while stuck in bed.... yeah).

In the mean time, vote for Hera in the Virtual Character Tourney. If she wins I'll do bonus polls that y'all request.

#Mod Update #Not A Poll #Don't worry I still have other bonus polls planned. But between my best-shapes bracket and becoming a mod of haveyouheardthispodcast and so #getting a new spreadsheet to play with I haven't made graphics for the planned bonus polls either.#Also go follow fiction-podcast-tournament. I have nothing to do with that one but it has a good line-up and is currently in Round 1.

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killscreencinema · 4 years

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Mario Golf Advance Tour (GBA)

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You may not know about me from this blog - I’ve always had an affinity for golf... video game golf that is. Like most athletic activities, I suck at real life golf and can’t really afford to play it anyway. However, I find video game golf to be a nice way to relax with a game, kind of like how one might enjoy a quick session of Tetris or some other pick-up-and-play puzzle game.

Something I never realized, though, is what a perfect fusion golf and RPGs are. It makes all the sense in the world - you level-up by playing more golf and increase stats by purchasing new equipment like clubs and maybe even accessories like gloves and golf shoes. It works together so well!

Nintendo must have realized this as well when they published Mario Gold Advance Tour for the Game Boy Advance in 2004. In the game’s story mode, you pick between two golf amateurs named Ella and Neil. Then you set out on your quest to become the best golfer, by participating in singles and doubles tourneys, match plays against the local champs, and successfully taking on the challenging golf mini-games if you think you got the stuff for it. Eventually, once you defeat all the tournaments, you are invited to participate in Princess Peach’s tournament against the likes of Mario, Bowser, and others!

You may have noticed that the Mario crew seem to have taken a back seat in their own game and that is probably my biggest gripe about Mario Golf Advance Tour. It would have been nice to play through story mode as, you know, MARIO or anyone else from the Mario-verse instead of two generic kid characters. Hell, it would have been nice to at least play against Mario characters as the club champs, instead of the bland, uninteresting club champs you do compete with. Jeez, I’ve see Mii’s that look more interesting than these folks. So that’s super lame.

That being said, you CAN play as Mario and the gang via the Quick Play option in the main menu, but that’s almost feels pointless compared to the main story mode. That would be like if Super Mario RPG only featured two kids we’ve never seen before as playable characters for the whole game, but there’s an option in the main menu to play the original Super Mario Bros. arcade to legitimize Mario being in the title of the game.

If you can you get past that barrier, Mario Golf Advance Tour is a GREAT game, with consistent golf physics, tight controls, colorful graphics, and the kind of bland but soothing music you’d expect from most golf games. I mean, sure, when you play doubles, your partner is usually a fucking idiot, who refuses to take the most obvious shots, preferring instead to hit the ball into hazards and the rough at every opportunity. That can be an infuriating handicap, but the game is setup so you can just play singles if you want and still unlock every course (you just won’t unlock EVERYTHING else in the game should you conquer both singles and doubles matches).

So if you still have a Game Boy Advance, or the game is available on Virtual Console, or, like me, you happen to have a decent GBA emulator, give Mario Golf Advance Tour a try!

#mario golf advance tour #super mario #nintendo #game boy advance #retrogaming #golf #video games #mario #luigi #bowser #toad #princess peach #wario #yoshi #waluigi

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ladyandtheghost · 5 years

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Reason #23: Ambiguity and (Duck-) Decoys - Why we have every right to question everything we have been “told” in Season 7

In “real life” we tend to go by the “duck test” (”If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck.”) but in fiction we rely on the way something is presented to us by the author or film maker to denote one thing or the other.

In good fiction, plots and characters are ideally presented as multi-faceted, complex and “ambiguous”, i.e. enabling different ways of interpretation and also enabling twists and changes throughout the story (e.g. character can develop in different directions, and plots can take surprising turns known as “plot twists”)

So far, so good.

Then why is it that we are suddenly supposed to all turn our brains off and accept everything we have been presented or “told” up to Season 7 of GoT as gospel, as an unquestionable “truth” that is not up for interpretation?

If D&D tell us in Season 7 that it “looks like a duck” do we automatically have to believe it?

Pretty sure D&D laugh every time they see articles going around pushing the “decoys” they have planted in Season 7

After 7 years of being deceived and “shocked” by Game of Thrones’ twists and turns, how do we react after the penultimate season, heading for the finale? Have we learned to question the “truths” of one season going into the next?

Exactly...we haven’t.

We still tend to go for the most “obvious”, the most blatantly advertised thing - a bit like magpies, we love to be distracted by the shiny and glamorous, the “badass” moments, explosions and roaring dragons...

When it comes to plot developments and characterisation, though, the show makers are very crafty and careful not to give away too much that can not be retracted later - they “tell” us one thing, yet at the same time “show” us the opposite; they bait and switch, open up possibilities in ALL directions...

What was Littlefinger’s cryptic speech to Sansa all about^^ if not to make us aware that things are almost NEVER as they seem...

Basically, we are being explicitly “told” about one thing and therefore assume that it is exactly as it is being told and assume the characters who tell us these things are telling the truth ---> the Duck (it’s also often the “popular opinion”)

However, when we consider other interpretations of the same thing, it turns out that there is a lot of ambiguity and the “duck” may just be a “decoy” to distract us and set us up for a plot twist...

Examples:

Who or what is the Song of Ice and Fire?

The Duck/popular opinion: Jon and Dani, because Melisandre said it...and she’s always right...

Ambiguity/other interpretations: Jon himself is the son(g) of ice and fire (the R+L=J reveal yet has to happen on screen); or, it’s literally the title of the chronicle Sam will write about the two great threats to Westeros: ice = the NK; fire=Dani T.

Jon Snow’s motives in S7:

The Duck/popular opinion: Jon Snow is incapable of lying or playing “the game” because he said so in the dragon pit, and Tyrion said he trusts him and Tyrion is always right! Also, Cersei said that Jon is Ned Stark’s son and she knows Ned Stark’s son would never lie and we know that Cersei is always right..

Ambiguity/other interpretations: Jon is a political player in the game now who has lied before and has lied again to everyone about his allegiances to secure the force of dragon fire for his quest to save the North/Westeros; Jon would absolutely lie and deceive to make sure his family and people are safe and well;

Who is the “Younger, more beautiful Queen”:

The Duck/popular opinion: It can only be Da*nerys, because Margaery is dead; and Cersei thinks it’s Dany and Cersei is always right. Plus, Dani is the fan favourite everyone expects to win and get everything she wanted, so she must be the one to cast Cersei down.

Ambiguity/other interpretations: Sansa Stark who is the dark horse candidate and was there from the beginning with Cersei and has *actually* already taken “all you hold dear” away from Cersei, being the reason why Joffrey, Myrcella and Tommen had to die, not to mention unwittingly contributing to their deaths; also from what we saw in the promo pics to S8, Jaime is wearing House Stark armor - Sansa is head of House Stark, so he is fighting for her now. It’s actually becoming quite blantant here...

Jon Snow’s (Romantic) Endgame:

The Duck/popular opinion: Da*nerys, because Tyrion told us Jon’s in love with her and Davos said he looked at her boobs, and both Tyrion and Davos are always right! Also because Dani loves Jon, so Jon *must* also be in love with Dani, otherwise it would not be *fair*. There is no way this love could only be on-sided because all other men are in love with Dany so Jon must be, too. And last but not least: they had sex, and we know ALL couples who have sex are endgame and get a HEA)

Ambiguity/other interpretations: Sansa who is Jon’s cousin, not sister; and continuously “shown” together with Jon in situations, scenes and contexts that are blatantly ��romantic” - this is also to a lesser degree still possible with Arya, though their relationship was always clear to be a beautiful “sibling bond” and their reunion and interactions happen too late in the show now to be established as equally “ambiguous” as Jon and Sansa’s relationship; or, None of the above because Jon only loved Ygritte and is reunited with her in death - until proven otherwise this is also a valid interpretation; since Jon is canonically “shown” to care deeply for Sansa, to react (even overreact) and as it is confirmed in the scipts that their relationship has an unspoken “subtext” that permeates their interactions, Jon is framed as and “shown” to the viewer as the romantic hero to Sansa’s heroine.

Sansa Stark’s third and last husband:

The Duck/popular opinion pt. 1: Tyrion or the Hound, because they were kind to her in King’s Landing and therefore deserve to have her because girls should always give themselves to men who are “nice” to them, no matter whether they are attractive or not...

The Duck pt. 2: virtually any other young male character with the exception of Jon because Jon *belongs* to Dani and fans want them to be endgame, so if Sansa gets another shot at romance, it could be anyone - just not Jon - even candidates who never interacted with her and are already paired up in other ships, i.e. Braime or Gendrya.

Ambiguity/other interpretations: Ned Stark’s words that Sansa should marry someone “brave, gentle and strong” establish Jon as the only possible candidate by way of elimination (Tyrion is not strong; the Hound is not gentle); it also makes zero sense for Sansa to be romantically involved with any of the following: Gendry, Pod or Jaime, she had next to no contact or screen time with them and Gendry is clearly linked to Arya, just as Jaime is linked to Brienne; according to the Ashford Tourney theory, Sansa’s last suitor will be a Targaryen and there is only one male Targaryen left.

All these plot points and character arcs^^ are open for interpretation one way or another. These characters, their motivations and feelings are deliberately hidden or revealed, “shown” or “not shown” to leave the ultimate ending and the fate of these characters wide open and “ambiguous” until the moment of “revelation”, the moment when it is convenient for the writers of the story to reveal what they are truly thinking, feeling and planning.

And deep down, people know this to be true. This is how Game of Thrones works. It’s the only way it worked in the past and unless we want the final season to be the “duck” of the previous season - i.e. everything is revealed to be exactly as it has been told to us in S7 - there will be some major turn arounds and twists!

Not all of the “other interpretations” are equally possible, but they are as valid as the “duck” versions certain fans want to see. Some of the “ducks” might be right, others might just be “decoys”. And it may turn out that none of these^^ ideas by us fans are correct and D&D and GRRM throw us for an even bigger loop than we expected.

All I know is, it would be a disservice to this great show with it’s fantastic ambiguous characters and plots to assume that the writers have no more tricks up their sleeves and that they already told us exactly what is going to happen in the finale.

If so, why bother with all the secrecy - if we already saw the endgame on the EW cover?

#jonsa #jon x sansa #Anti-Jonerys #anti-daenerys #reasons #meta

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janiedean · 5 years

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jaime, pia and perceived ideals of knighthood vs effective knightly deeds

for jaime lannister week, day seven: free choice [in this case: META DAY? APPARENTLY.]

so, for the occasion I figured I’d rant about a specific instance in jaime’s asos/affc arc that might be a tad overlooked as it features a minor character but that I think is really important to his arc/his character evolution, as in: how his subplot concerning pia in both books actually shows that while he thinks he turned into the smiling knight, for someone he’s been arthur dayne all along and how actually pia is about the one person to whom he’s never not been anyone or anything else else, which should in turn suggest that he’s been arthur dayne deep down for way longer than he himself thinks.

first of all, I would like to go into the canon instances on which jaime himself reflects on the issue:

The world was simpler in those days, Jaime thought, and men as well as swords were made of finer steel. Or was it only that he had been fifteen? They were all in their graves now, the Sword of the Morning and the Smiling Knight, the White Bull and Prince Lewyn, Ser Oswell Whent with his black humor, earnest Jon Darry, Simon Toyne and his Kingswood Brotherhood, bluff old Sumner Crakehall. And me, that boy I was . . . when did he die, I wonder? When I donned the white cloak? When I opened Aerys's throat? That boy had wanted to be Ser Arthur Dayne, but someplace along the way he had become the Smiling Knight instead. ASOS, Jaime VIII

"When I was a squire I told myself I'd be the man to slay the Smiling Knight."

"The Smiling Knight?" She sounded lost. "Who was that?"

The Mountain of my boyhood. Half as big but twice as mad. AFFC, Jaime IV

"You could kill Lord Beric, Ser Jaime. You slew the Smiley Knight. Please, my lord, I beg you, stay and help us with Lord Beric and the Hound." Her pale fingers caressed his golden ones.

Does she think that I can feel that? "The Sword of the Morning slew the Smiling Knight, my lady. Ser Arthur Dayne, a better knight than me." AFFC, Jaime IV

now, there are a few things we can deduce from these (there’s more on the arthur subject, but the crux here is the contraposition):

jaime has a very idealized view of his squiring period, obviously, because it’s the one time in which he was doing what he felt like he was born to do (being a knight) and in which he was part of an heroic quest/deed (slaying the smiling knight) that he carried out with his role model (arthur dayne);

the smiling knight himself is compared to gregor clegane, ie the worst person we could think of in these series;

in jaime’s head there’s a definite dichotomy in between arthur (extreme good) and the smiling knight (extreme bad);

jaime wanted to be like arthur (which he has no problem admitting now post hand-loss) but thinks that he turned into the smiling knight ie the worst possible other end of the specter, so he’a actually making himself look worse than he actually is as nothing he’s done in canon until that point is comparable to what gregor did if we stand by that comparison;

jaime *told himself he would slay the smiling knight* ie he dreamed of being the person who’d carry out that quest - it earned him the knighthood and he took part in it but he didn’t exactly do it as he points out later, as he says that arthur was a better knight than he was.

now, while we could discuss for ages about how jaime’s extremely idealized view of arthur and the rest of aerys’s KG doesn’t necessarily match up with reality (I mean, we don’t know much about what arthur was up to during the rebellion and we’ll never know until we get a direct account of what happened at the tower of joy but the man died trying to prevent ned from reaching his dying sister after his side lost the war, after rhaegar died and so on, which doesn’t look exactly knightly to me or at least it’s fairly morally gray/shady from the elements that we have), but the point I want to make here is that the way jaime sees it, he completely failed to uphold knightly vows, hasn’t measured up to his role model, turned into the kind of monster that he was dreaming of slaying when he was young and ponders when exactly that switch happened. and he mentions as possibilities a) when he went into the KG, b) when he killed aerys.

before I move on to the actual point, though, I’d like to point out one moment what is actually the oath knights swear when being anointed, as per ASOS and The Hedge Knight:

[..], do you swear before the eyes of gods and men to defend those who cannot defend themselves, to protect all women and children, to obey your captains, your liege lord, and your king, to fight bravely when needed and do such other tasks as are laid upon you, however hard or humble or dangerous they may be?

In the name of the Warrior I charge you to be brave. In the name of the Father I charge you to be just. In the name of the Mother I charge you to defend the young and innocent. In the name of the Maid I charge you to protect all women....

so, very shortly and not counting the ones about obeying one’s commander or liege lord, the crux is protecting innocent/weaker people including women and children who can’t defend themselves any better.

so, jaime thinks he’s done nothing of that and that he’s not doing anything of that. fair enough. follow-up under the cut for length.

now, on to pia: before going on to how she matters in his arc, we should keep in mind that from what we know from arya’s chapters in a clash of kings:

Arya heard all sorts of secrets just by keeping her ears open as she went about her duties. Pretty Pia from the buttery was a slut who was working her way through every knight in the castle. Hot Pie was kneading bread, his arms floured up to his elbows. "Pia saw something in the buttery last night." Arya made a rude noise. Pia was always seeing things in the buttery. Usually they were men. Tothmure had been sent to the axe for dispatching birds to Casterly Rock and King's Landing the night Harrenhal had fallen, Lucan the armorer for making weapons for the Lannisters, Goodwife Harra for telling Lady Whent's household to serve them, the steward for giving Lord Tywin the keys to the treasure vault. The cook was spared (some said because he'd made the weasel soup), but stocks were hammered together for pretty Pia and the other women who'd shared their favors with Lannister soldiers. Stripped and shaved, they were left in the middle ward beside the bear pit, free for the use of any man who wanted them.

so: we know that she’s a serving hand (so she’s a woman of low birth who has virtually no protection whatsoever), that she’s good-looking and that she most likely enjoys having sex (nothing bad about that)… but that people shame her for it (see the first quote). we also can deduce that she was willing in her enjoyment of sex and so on… but the last that we know from arya’s chapters, when roose conquers it, she’s stripped and shaved and left free for use for having slept with lannister soldiers, so we can add that on top of that she most likely was raped and we can deduce that not many people would have considered it such after because of her previous reputation for promiscuity.

now, what happens after is that qyburn sends her to jaime figuring that he’d appreciate it:

“I understand you had a visitor last night,” said Qyburn. “I trust that you enjoyed her?”

Jaime gave him a cool look. “She did not say who sent her.”

The maester smiled modestly. “Your fever was largely gone, and I thought you might enjoy a bit of exercise. Pia is quite skilled, would you not agree? And so . . . willing.”

what we can deduce here is that qyburn sent her to jaime after the whole part where she was put up for *free use* by any man who wanted her and he still says she’s willing, which is actually true but more on that later, but to qyburn it really doesn’t matter most likely because of her previous fame. also he talks about her as if she’s not a person with feelings (she’s skilled, you enjoyed her etc.), while jaime does not sleep with her out of faithfulness towards cersei, but what’s interesting is how pia said she saw the entire thing:

“She had been that, certainly. She had slipped in his door and out of her clothes so quickly that Jaime had thought he was still dreaming.

It hadn’t been until the woman slid in under his blankets and put his good hand on her breast that he roused. She was a pretty little thing, too. “I was a slip of a girl when you came for Lord Whent’s tourney and the king gave you your cloak,” she confessed. “You were so handsome all in white, and everyone said what a brave knight you were. Sometimes when I’m with some man, I close my eyes and pretend it’s you on top of me, with your smooth skin and gold curls. I never truly thought I’d have you, though.”

Sending her away had not been easy after that, but Jaime had done it all the same. I have a woman, he reminded himself. “Do you send girls to everyone you leech?” he asked Qyburn.

“More often Lord Vargo sends them to me. He likes me to examine them, before . . . well, suffice it to say that once he loved unwisely, and he has no wish to do so again. But have no fear, Pia is quite healthy. As is your maid of Tarth.”

Jaime gave him a sharp look. “Brienne?”

now, never mind that the entire exchange ends up with jaime finding out that brienne is in danger and it’s just before his dream and the bear pit as in, his Extremely Knightly Moment in asos which is also relevant as that episode (while not the first knightly thing he does after losing the hand since saving brienne from being raped while on their road trip would count) is the first major gesture of the kind he does: we know that after she was most likely raped repeatedly, she got sent to *him*, and we find out that she’s actually been thinking of him in extremely knightly terms all along since she saw him getting knighted. now she says she was a slip of a girl so she most likely was around four or five and she still remembers that he looked handsome and brave (knightly virtues) and that when she’s with other people she pretends it’s jaime making love to her, to the point that she can’t believe her luck that she’d actually end up with him. now, he refuses (even if he finds it hard), but he’s most likely one of the few people (if not the only one) who would have done that and he also doesn’t appreciate qyburn basically whoring her out, so at least he’s giving her some basic respect… but the point here is that to pia he sounds/looks like the embodiment of everything he thinks he’s not (brave/knightly) and she’s been thinking that since he went into the kingsguard ie one of the two moments that in the above quote he thought might have been when he turned from arthur into the smiling knight, which therefore would *not* match her idea of him as a splendid example of knightly valor… in theory.

now, at this point, regardless of what happened in between arya leaving harrenhal and jaime getting there, pia still seems to not having undergone through massive changes since what we saw in acok - she’s still pretty, she enjoys sex and she definitely is willing at least when it comes to the one man she’s been having an idealized crush on for years and that she thinks of when having sex with other men.

then jaime goes back to harrenhal in affc before heading for riverrun and he meets her again:

Any hopes he might have nursed of finding Shagwell, Pyg, or Zollo languishing in the dungeons were sadly disappointed. The Brave Companions had abandoned Vargo Hoat to a man, it would seem. Of Lady Whent's people, only three remained—the cook who had opened the postern gate for Ser Gregor, a bent-back armorer called Ben Blackthumb, and a girl named Pia, who was not near as pretty as she had been when Jaime saw her last. Someone had broken her nose and knocked out half her teeth. The girl fell at Jaime's feet when she saw him, sobbing and clinging to his leg with hysterical strength till Strongboar pulled her off. "No one will hurt you now," he told her, but that only made her sob the louder. +

“Take the whore as well," Ser Bonifer urged. "You know the one. The girl from the dungeons."

"Pia." The last time he had been here, Qyburn had sent the girl to his bed, thinking that would please him. But the Pia they had brought up from the dungeons was a different creature from the sweet, simple, giggly creature who'd crawled beneath his blankets. She had made the mistake of speaking when Ser Gregor wanted quiet, so the Mountain had smashed her teeth to splinters with a mailed fist and broken her pretty little nose as well. He would have done worse, no doubt, if Cersei had not called him down to King's Landing to face the Red Viper's spear. Jaime would not mourn him.

"Pia was born in this castle," he told Ser Bonifer. "It is the only home she has ever known."

"She is a font of corruption," said Ser Bonifer. "I won't have her near my men, flaunting her . . . parts."

so, what happens is that when gregor (as in, the person jaime compared the smiling knight with before) was in harrenhal he smashed her teeth with a mailed first because she spoke out of turn and as per what the next quote says, she’s also been repeatedly raped again, and she’s definitely way traumatized and in a position of absolute helplessness… and she throws herself at jaime’s feet most likely seeing him as a possible savior - let’s remember that she’s idealized him as a brave knight all along, and he does promise she won’t be hurt, which is what he technically should do per his knightly vows. now, when he tries to argue for her staying in harrenhal, ser bonifer ie the person appointed to mind the castle in his absence says he doesn’t want her around because she’s a supposed whore regardless of how bad off she is right now. he could have ignored the issue, but he doesn’t and takes her as a washerwoman in his own army, and with that he already removes her from a place where she would have been even less safe than usual, but the important thing is in the next part:

Pia listened as solemnly as a girl of five being lessoned by her septa. That's all she is, a little girl in a woman's body, scarred and scared. Peck was taken with her, though. Jaime suspected that the boy had never known a woman, and Pia was still pretty enough, so long as she kept her mouth closed. There's no harm in him bedding her, I suppose, so long as she's willing.

One of the Mountain's men had tried to rape the girl at Harrenhal, and had seemed honestly perplexed when Jaime commanded Ilyn Payne to take his head off. "I had her before, a hunnerd times," he kept saying as they forced him to his knees. "A hunnerd times, m'lord. We all had her." When Ser Ilyn presented Pia with his head, she had smiled through her ruined teeth.

now: never mind that jaime (who as we all know is not the kind of person who reacts with a shrug when hearing/knowing someone has been raped or he wouldn’t be feeling guilty about his inaction with rhaella nor he’d have risked his hide to save brienne from it thrice two of which were post-hand loss and in one of those he wasn’t even able to stand by himself) always thinks that if she has to bed someone the important thing is that she’s *willing* nor thinks less of her for he promiscuity, which for westeros is fairly progressive all things considered… but he gives her the head of the guy who tried to rape her and by his own admission did it before *a hundred times* same as other soldiers in his group, and… she smiles through ruined teeth ie she doesn’t even care about hiding it, when later she takes care to cover her mouth when she speaks around other nobles. also, we can discuss that when she and peck start sleeping together jaime tells them to use his bed and:

The squire turned beet red.

"If she'll have you, take her. She'll teach you a few things you'll find useful on your wedding night, I don't doubt, and you're not like to get a bastard by her." Pia had spread her legs for half his father's army and never quickened; most like the girl was barren. "If you bed her, though, be kind to her."

"Kind, my lord? How . . . how would I . . . ?"

"Sweet words. Gentle touches. You don't want to wed her, but so long as you're abed treat her as you would your bride."

now: obviously he can’t tell his squire (who is still noble) that he should marry a woman who is a commoner, most likely barren and way older than he is, but he tells him that he still should treat her *as if she was* until they sleep together, and his standard for how you’d treat your bride is sweet words and gentle touches which most likely is not what pia’s gotten until this point much if ever, and throughout the entire thing while he is attracted to her and he doesn’t deny it to himself he still doesn’t act on it. and meanwhile since she’s still traveling with his army of which he’s in command she’s in a position of relative safety, never mind that if people know that he ordered beheaded the guy who tried to touch her when she wasn’t willing she definitely isn’t under that risk right now.

back to the beginning, what are the knightly vows again? protecting innocent/weaker people including women and children who can’t defend themselves any better. what has jaime done with pia on her end? he didn’t sleep with her nor treated her as a commodity, he has quite literally protected her taking her into his service when she was in danger, he’s made sure that she wouldn’t have to sleep with anyone she didn’t want to, has respected her agency and gave her the head of at least one of the guys who raped her, which considering that the person hurting her was *gregor clegane* ie the man he’s roundabout compared *himself* to in asos if we go by the smiling knight = gregor comparison… it’s kind of the entire opposite thing and absolutely counts as fulfilling every single knightly vow he made since he protected/saved/avenged a woman in a position of absolute helplessness about whose agency no one cares because everyone decided that since she likes sex then she must always want it.

the thing that’s important though is that by doing that… he’s pretty much proved her right, in the sense that if she’s always imagined him as the brave handsome knight since she was a little girl and he had just been anointed and she always idealized him to the point where she’d think about him when being with other people because obviously his idealized self would be everything she might want then he about went and proved her right regardless of any other shortcoming of his or regardless of any horrible thing he might have done before or after, because to her he most likely would be a knight out of songs since he did waltz in, promised no one would hurt her after it happened to her and actually delivered on it in spades.

but, while for *her* it’s definitely the case, jaime himself doesn’t think of it in very knightly terms, at most we have:

“Ser Harwyn says those tales are lies." Lady Amerei wound a braid around her finger. "He has promised me Lord Beric's head. He's very gallant." She was blushing beneath her tears.

Jaime thought back on the head he'd given to Pia. He could almost hear his little brother chuckle. Whatever became of giving women flowers? Tyrion might have asked. He would have had a few choice words for Harwyn Plumm as well, though gallant would not have been one of them.

now, he’s thinking of it in the context of a romantic gesture since it was described as one before, but then he says gallant wouldn’t be one of those words and he doesn’t really register what he did as *gallant* or knightly while most likely pia would. also, he’s comparing himself to both the smiling knight and gregor (in another quote later he dreams of punching in the teeth one of cersei’s lovers the way gregor did while he’s still working through how betrayed that made him feel, but thing is, he doesn’t act on that at any point except when he punches ronnet for brienne and it’s nowhere near as bad as what he describes himself as) but he behaves in the entire opposite way since at least in pia’s case gregor about ruined her life and he avenged it/helped her/did what he could for her which is about more than most likely anyone ever did, and to her certainly everything he did would indeed look as knightly as it goes.

but like the entire point is that jaime doesn’t think of the knightly deeds he actually pulls off as such - he doesn’t think that of saving brienne’s life at the bear pit/saving her from being raped/giving her oathkeeper when brienne herself definitely sees them as such as in her affc chapters she keeps on thinking about both instances as proof that he’s Definitely A Honorable Person, he doesn’t think that of what he does with pia nor of anything else positive he’s ever done/does, which ties with the overall arc he has in which he has to realize that he can still be the person he wanted to be. in asos he thinks he turned into the smiling knight when he’s never been all along, in both asos and affc he does behave following the code when he can and hates not being able to when he can’t/when he’s forced to (see having to take riverrun when he says he has sworn to not raise arms against the tullys and he hates it) but he still doesn’t seem to have taken the leap and realized that he actually behaves in entirely different ways than he thinks (see that he thinks he’s the same as cersei when most of the things he does/he cares about are the entire contrary), so the subplot with pia shows that he’s actually doing that without realizing it… with the twist that, going back to the beginning:

he thinks he turned into the smiling knight (= gregor) sometime along the way when he wanted to be arthur dayne, then he’s the literal knight in shining armor to a girl who was hurt by gregor and his father’s men who always thought he was pretty much the embodiment of the institution same as jaime thought arthur dayne was, and it’s a girl who has no idea of anything else he might have done other than killing aerys and she obviously doesn’t care since she doesn’t mention it when she goes to his bed the first time. so there is someone to whom he was an arthur dayne all along, and the moment he could do something for her, he actually delivered and definitely was arthur dayne to her, not the smiling knight, and she’d know since she was hurt by the man jaime himself compared to him first. now, it’s important because everyone else that has had a chance to know that jaime actually does have that potential is people with whom he has an actual rship/who have seen him at his worst/with whom he has unresolved Issues To Solve ASAP (I’m meaning mostly brienne and tyrion - brienne didn’t like him whatsoever in the beginning and with tyrion there’s the whole matter of the tysha backstory which obviously ruined the high opinion tyrion had of him even if I think it’s salvageable) but in this case pia already thought she was arthur dayne As A Paragon Of Knightly Virtues (not as how arthur actually was which is as stated an entire other issue in itself) and he lived up to it without even realizing he was doing it, but he doesn’t even think once about whether he shouldn’t help her or he shouldn’t give her the time of the day. like, he doesn’t really consider doing otherwise or not giving a shit about what happens to her regardless. which should also automatically suggest that it’s actually in his nature to do the right thing/follow the basics of his vows. obviously he didn’t realize that but as finding out he has it in himself to be the person he wanted to be when he was young and that he didn’t turn into a gregor stand-in is I think one of the main themes in his arc, I also think this specific subplot really underlines how he’s still in the middle of figuring it out while also stressing that regardless of what he thinks about what he is or what he became, he can be arthur dayne As A Paragon and that he can deliver on that/be what he always dreamed he could be for someone who already saw him as that paragon and whom he hasn’t disappointed in any other way.

in short: by helping someone who exactly meets all the criteria for ‘category he swore to protect when taking his vows’ when this person already saw him as a paragon, he’s actually contradicting his own assessment of his morality/honor or lack thereof, because while he thinks he wanted to be arthur dayne and turned into the contrary, to other people he always was arthur dayne and when he could show them that he could be, he delivered on those expectations, differently from what most others did to him, and I find it quite a beautiful if heartbreaking parallel and also definitely a not so small hint that his overall storyline is going towards realize that he, in fact, isn’t the smiling knight at all and never actually has been.

#jaimelannisterweek #jaime lannister #gotjaimelannister #jaime lannister week #pia #asoiaf meta #ch: jaime lannister #janie writes meta #huh i managed to write this finally #HAVE SOME META FOR FREE FOR ALL DAY i guess #also apparently i tagged wrong the previous two fics lmao i'm a genius am i not? brb retagging #do i have feelings about jaime and pia? most likely #will i ever stop having them? never

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lamarmcarter · 4 years

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A WNBA Wishlist for NBA 2K21 & Beyond

The current state of the world has created newfound time for many of us while we wait for sports to resume and, much more importantly, life to return to some semblance of normal.

To pass the time, and to follow the recent buzz created by the 2020 WNBA Draft, I have taken a deep dive into NBA 2K20’s WNBA integration and created a wishlist of features for the next iterations of the game. The first year of WNBA in 2K surpassed EA Sports’ two-year head start with NBA Live 18 and Live 19 on a number of fronts; that said, for 2K to bring the integration up to the standard W fans deserve and their industry-leading NBA simulation has created, I’ve logged these 20 things need to be added as soon as possible:

Fix the In-Game Commentary Audio One of the most glaring issues for 2K20 with the WNBA were the multiple instances of the in-game announcers misgendering player actions (using “he/him/his” instead of “she/her/hers”). I haven’t heard any actions in NBA modes using female wording so hearing it in the W games makes the mode feel a bit unprofessional. There are some times where these mentions could just be unclear pronunciations, but even that happening in a game where there is usually so much polish on the commentary is a problem. I’ve had fellow gamers on Twitter confirm that this has happened to them so it’s definitely not an isolated incident.

Choose more recognizable and more diverse announcers The all-male trio of announcers in the WNBA modes did an admirable job providing commentary in the games. While I generally enjoyed their commentary (sans point No.1) and it seemed to get better after launch, sometimes their insights into players were a bit formulaic (a descriptor, player name, another descriptor). Initially, hearing these anecdotes about the players was refreshing but noticing this recurring template was disheartening after a while. Also, in a game that has a wide mix of recognizable, veteran NBA announcers on the men’s side and sports the great Doris Burke among that mix, it was hard to understand how the WNBA mode only possessed an all-male crew unknown in WNBA circles.

A list of seasoned WNBA/women’s basketball announcers that should be approached for 2K21 and beyond include but are not limited to: LaChina Robinson, Kara Lawson, Rebecca Lobo, Adam Amin, Ryan Ruocco, Christy Winters-Scott, Carolyn Peck, Doris Burke, Holly Rowe (who could also serve in David Aldrige’s sideline role), Cheryl Miller, Debbie Antonelli, Pam Ward, Rosalyn Gold-Onwude, Maria Taylor, and Ann Meyers.

Add the pre-game/post-game shows If any of the veteran announcers could be added to 2K21, it would make perfect sense to create a pre-game/post-game panel package for the W. Any grouping of those announcers could easily create analysis for the teams and give the women the same treatment that Shaq, Kenny Smith, and Ernie Johnson give the men.

Extend the season mode past one season Being able to play a full season in 2K20 was one of the game’s best features. However, knowing that you couldn’t go into multiple years like in NBA MyLeague was disappointing. Knowing this, I still grinded through a season with the Las Vegas Aces from launch until a few weeks ago (for the record: 27-7, Liz Cambage as MVP and Finals MVP, and a title!) only to be left with the empty feeling of not being able to have my curated team (with a few late season trades) run it back in future years. Maybe the full 80-year NBA MyLeague treatment can’t be done, but having the auto draft classes, progressions, and offseason items necessary for a 15-25 year run should be doable.

Allow for creation of female players, custom rosters and draft classes As more and more attention is given to women’s basketball in this social media age, devoted fans may want to create draft classes of future college stars like NBA fans already do. Adding the option to create female players - individually or en masse - is necessary to allow for longer engagement with the league in the game. Outside of visualizing future players, being able to save and load custom rosters is also needed. This year’s one-season MyLeague would have been more bearable if I didn’t have to manually alter any fantasy rosters I wanted to experiment with every time I started a season.

Add a MyCareer storyline/path for Female MyPlayers to make the league In past editions of 2K and past versions of the Madden NFL franchise, game creators have worked around the NCAA’s old name, image and likeness restrictions by getting basic licenses from colleges to use their logos with generic rosters in MyCareer-type modes. Madden NFL 20’s Face of the Franchise mode particularly stood out: your QB chose a college to go to, and then as a senior played against two schools in the College Football Playoff semis and final.

A similar setup could be created for a Female MyCareer story: get a team license for 4-8 of the top women’s college basketball teams and have the created player go through the latter stages of the NCAA tourney before getting drafted to the W. Someone could create a player, choose from the licensed schools to commit, play a handful of games versus the other licensed schools (and their auto-generated rosters) in big moments over four years, and end by going through top teams as a senior (either with or without graduated alums in the W; imagine having to face Sabrina Ionescu, Satou Sabally, Ruthy Hebard and Oregon or Tyasha Harris, Mikiah Herbert Harrigan, Dawn Staley and South Carolina for the title to set your draft stock). Simulate the draft with Commissioner Cathy Engelbert like it’s done with NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, and roll right into your season with the same bells and whistles as a male MyPlayer.

Allow Female MyPlayer into the Neighborhood/Park areas I personally don’t play too much of the online Park games in 2K (another story for another day) but just like on basketball courts around the world, if female MyPlayers are available, they should be able to run with the guys. The Neighborhood could be broken up three ways: a portion for guys only runs, a section for girls only runs, and a co-ed section. Give the female MyPlayers the same access to all the perks of the Neighborhood (gear, the Gatorade training center, MyCourt, etc).

Allow for Playoff Only Mode The WNBA Playoffs are probably the most unique in all of the major sports leagues. Adding a Playoff only mode to the season mode would allow for more content to be created and simulations to be run, especially if All-Time and Classic teams are added.

Continue to improve on strong face scan data 2K’s face scans were great out the gate in both quality and quantity. Continuing to improve on that start to gain 100 percent accuracy has to be the goal. Scanning sessions will probably be difficult in the current age of coronavirus, but if fans can scan their faces in the game with an app, I’m sure something can be done with the W’s players remotely.

Scan in and/or properly gender each head coach We heard that some WNBA coaches - if not all - were scanned for 2K20 but none of them are in the game. If correcting this can’t be done in 2K21, at least put in generic stand ins of the correct gender and race. Example: Minnesota (Cheryl Reeve - white woman) and Las Vegas (Bill Laimbeer - white man) both have black male avatars as their head coaches in the game. All 12 coach avatars in the game are men and even though there are more male coaches than female ones in the league, the virtual stand-ins are still incorrect. If the game could get unique scans for cheerleaders and female characters in MyCareer, I’m sure some stand in men and women could be added if the WNBA coaches can’t be added like their NBA counterparts.

Align commentator and arena PA announcer pronunciations A subtle tweak: making sure the game announcers and the in-arena PAs are announcing players’ names correctly. I’ve heard some very off names on both sides

Halftime: show team stats screen for longer than four seconds When I’m in a game and want to look at the halftime stats to figure out how I’m doing, I’ve felt rushed because the team stats graphic that shows in-between halves comes down just as quickly as it goes up.

Allow for online Play Now The NBA and 2K found a way to entertain its fans during our quarantine with online competitions that were aired on TV. If the WNBA season is postponed or cancelled, the league cannot facilitate a similar tournament in 2K20 because the only way for two people to faceoff with W teams is in the offline Play Now mode. Bringing in an online option will expand opportunities for fans to learn about the WNBA players and teams.

The defending champion Washington Mystics recently decided to do streams of their games on 2K but only as CPU vs CPU simulations instead of remote player vs player. Not having the ability to play someone else online limited their options and engagement opportunities.

WNBA Finals: actually put in a celebration sequence As I (proudly) mentioned, I won the title in my LVA season and after the final game, there was a quick CHAMPIONS graphic...and that’s it. No trophy celebrations, no locker room celebrations, nothing. In my semifinals win to get to the Finals, the NBA “conference trophy” cutscenes played postgame at least. Adding that touch would surely be appreciated by the W community.

Double check player cutouts Jordin Canada (SEA) won an award in my LVA season and her player image was Jewell Loyd. It’s the only error I’ve personally seen on the player cutouts but checking those are important.

All-Time Teams and Past Champions Adding Classic WNBA teams and/or legends via All-Time teams would be the ultimate way to honor the league’s history and give old and new fans that pick up 2K a virtual time capsule of the W. My suggestions would be to add:

Champions and Runners-Up from every year (1997-present)

All-Time Teams that go 10-12 deep (I took a crack at suggestions here): https://bit.ly/2xFW2HL. I’m sure some W writers with deeper knowledge than mine could fill in the blanks.

Add a 2K League connection/element Tying back into the online Play Now mode, incorporating the NBA 2K League with WNBA action would be amazing. Either have the 2KL teams do special tourneys using W teams; create events or a full league for the W that has to be at minimum 75% women (because, shoot, I’d want to play too!); or do WNBA player-specific events. Imagine how cool it would be to see Aerial Powers and Allisha Gray going at it as themselves in 2K instead of just picking NBA teams.

Put in some general trade logic Currently, any trades in the MyLeague mode are set to automatically go through, no matter how outrageous. Some basic trade logic (at minimum based on overalls, salary and position) would be nice to give things a realistic feel.

Fix the jerseys screen in season In WNBA Play Now, when you go to adjust jerseys, there’s a graphic with WNBA players in the background. In Season, that graphic is of NBA players.

Honor Gigi Bryant, Payton Chester, and Alyssa Altobelli, and Kobe Bryant Follow Commissioner Engelbert’s lead and find a way to honor Gigi and her Mamba Academy teammates. Maybe permission can be granted to create older versions of the girls to be placed into the game’s free agent pool.

At minimum, having some kind of graphic commemoration would be classy (maybe banners throughout the game or at Staples for Sparks games, since they were California natives). There’s also been the obvious rumblings of putting Kobe and Gigi on the cover. That would be amazing. If that can’t be done, a cover with Kobe and a WNBA player he was close to (Ionescu, Diana Taurasi, Loyd) would be fitting.

I do not want this list to diminish what 2K has excelled at with its first run with the WNBA. The gameplay is fun and true to form, the graphics are high quality, a very large amount of the face scans are on point, being able to play a full season is an excellent touch, and the features that are in the game are strong. However, 2K as a whole has a decades-long reputation for putting out a pace-setting game every year so wanting the WNBA’s section of it to be fully developed is something every true basketball fan can agree on.

I can’t wait to see which of these suggestions or others are implemented. What features would you want added for the WNBA?

#wnba #nba #nba2k #nba2k20 #women's basketball #video games #xbox #playstation #basketball

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