#but... there is a core element to brienne | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

agentrouka-blog · 2 years

Note

Do you think Braime mirror Jongritte?

(Disclaimer: I do not ship either couple. Quite the opposite. Peace.)

They mirror each other quite strongly in a number of images, the way a good foil situation is supposed to. Which is to say that the situations have similar elements but are fundamentally contrasting below the surface.

Forced together, secret travel, violence, deception, (the threat of) rape, vows, ugly women, personal growth, it's all very similar. It'd be a massive meta post to compare and contrast it all, and I can't do that right now. So I'll be superficial.

Take the cave scene and the bath in Harrenhal, as one example:

Both scenes involve an evolution of intimacy and a reassassment of each other.

The intimacy between Jaime and Brienne is emotional in nature, and it allows them to see each other more clearly. Jaime makes a very significant personal confession about Aerys and it leaves him questioning himself.

The water had grown cool. When Jaime opened his eyes, he found himself staring at the stump of his sword hand. The hand that made me Kingslayer. The goat had robbed him of his glory and his shame, both at once. Leaving what? Who am I now?

Jon and Ygritte have sex in a more physically nude way than before, but while Ygritte says this...

"You as well," Ygritte said as she yanked down her sheepskin breeches. "If you want to look you have to show. You know nothing, Jon Snow."

... neither does Jon actually undress when she demands it, there is also no actual emotional intimacy following. He sees her physical features, and makes this big speech about loving those (out of nowhere), but he lists nothing about her personality and he reveals nothing significant about himself but a sudden confidence to be sexually experimental. Jon very decidedly does not share any of his inner life with her. It's actually astonishingly superficial.

And he actually sees her less clearly. Both of these happen in the same chapter:

She was sopping wet down there, and no maiden, that was plain, but Jon did not care. -> -> -> What was he now? He did not want to look at that. "Were you a maid?"

Jon twists a previously obvious fact into a question. He distorts his own perception of reality, because the person he "loves" is not the person in front of him. It's a figment he is creating out of a person who took advantage of him.

Contrast Jaime's dream after leaving Brienne behind at Harrenhal:

The light was so dim that Jaime could scarcely see her, though they stood a scant few feet apart. In this light she could almost be a beauty, he thought. In this light she could almost be a knight.

He sees her more clearly in the aftermath of that confession, even cloaked in a dream. He is entirely free of her and on his way to safety, but he sees a person he cannot leave behind to a horrible fate, and he turns the whole travel group around to rescue her. He will end up giving her sword to fulfill a quest, like a true knight. Going forward, he specifically struggles with her opinion of his character, his ethics, his personality. (Though it doesn't actually make him a better person at his core.)

Jon left murderous Ygritte behind and still struggles with his image of her. In the end, all he had to give her was a kind lie about returning to the cave while she lay dying. He idealizes her to a point, but what aids him in the future are only the empirical facts about the wildlings that he learned from her. He isn't a better person for having been forced into a relationship with her. He always was a better person, he's just slightly smarter now.

Even the dramatic rescues are massive contrasts:

It is Jaime who leaps into the bear pit to save Brienne from a group of enemies, from violence and rape.

It is Summer who leaps into the confrontation to save Jon from a group of enemies that includes Ygritte, who forced him into sex and then shot at him with arrows.

Says it all, really.

#anti jon x ygritte #anti ygritte #jaime lannister #brienne of tarth #foils #parallels

37 notes · View notes

nossbean · 3 years

Text

Exchange recs 🥳🥳🥳

I haven’t read too many of the @jaime-brienne-fic-exchange gifts this year and still have to leave comments but I wanted to rec a few from the marvellous things I’ve read!

dream deep heavy sleeper (dream light heavy heart) [book canon] this fic is so goddamn soft. The author tagged it as unlikely post-LSH fic and I am wilfully closing my eyes to that and choosing to believe in the softness! A 5+1 fic where Brienne deliriously wakes on the Quiet Isle, doubtful of the feeling that Jaime was with her, only to wake another night, non-deliriously, and discover it wasn’t just a dream. This is a quiet, contemplative, sweet fic, with such a tender touch for Brienne and leaning into the romance of the pairing whilst (I assert!) cleaving to a core of reality for them. There are such lush descriptions of their shared space in their little cottage: the soft light and the physical closeness. I loved it a lot, it’s been added to my list of comfort reads! (4k, T)

Where I Cannot Stand [AU] a Firefly fusion, aka a thoroughly fun adventure-romance space western, though I admit my favourite part by far is the Jaime voice...! This is a really warm and very funny Jaime, more settled than he often is, surrounded by a found family he’s carefully built, and then Brienne turns up transporting a mystery! Noble, stubborn, kinda idealistic, and a terrible liar with excellent musculature? How can he resist?? Another element I adore is the cast of characters: Jon, Satin, Oberyn, Ellaria and Jeyne Westerling. Jaime loves them all and they love him back, and again Brienne as the newcomer is warmly welcomed and in amongst the plot shenanigans is a very cute crew-tries-their-hand-at-matchmaking thread with, um, mixed (if adorable and funny) success. Even if you haven’t seen Firefly, the worldbuilding is accessible and clear. It’s a pacey romp which left me smiling! (12.5k, T)

Yours are the Sweetest [book canon] another post-LSH fic! I am... so into this author’s prose. To call it sparse is totally incorrect, but it’s got a stripped down quality to it which works beautifully for the story and accentuates both POVs in ways I really loved sunking into. In this story, Brienne must trade Sansa to LSH for the lives of Jaime, Pod and Hyle. An intriguing premise to start, which the author plays out so damn well. There are also a few questions left unanswered, which was a bold choice that works really well and is (maybe paradoxically?) very satisfying to read! Ahhh I’m fretting I’m not managing to convey what I want with this rec but I also feel it’s a fic that’s best just -- experienced…! It’s lingered in the back of my brain like a song since I read it. (8k, E)

Declarations of the Everyday Type [AU] This one is just... super adorable! Fluff to the max, a delightful soulmark AU whereby one soulmate can write on themselves and their soulmate then sees correspondingly on their own skin. An established, wonderfully domestic Jaime and Brienne utilize in the most them way possible (which is to say: very enthusiastic, a little wry, a little practical, and very sweet) There’s also very fun baking involved and very fun soccer rounding things out. The author conveys established part of their established relationship deftly, and the whole fic feels so comfortable and lived in. Short, sweet, marvellous, and another I’m looking forward to returning to for comfort reading! (1k, T)

False Knights on the Road [book canon] and another post-LSH (Really such spoils this year…!) that I enjoyed immensely! The author captured a lot of the book tone and characterization all whilst painting a portrait of Brienne and Jaime collecting wayward children on their journey and honestlyyyy I could not get enough of it. That said, it isn’t exactly a fluffy fic for all there are fluffy moment: it deals with the fallout of LSH between JB in ways which ring (and indeed, the author’s Jaime voice caught so many of book!Jaime’s ticks, I’d have been wondering GRRM but for certain stunning turns of phrase which George could never, with due respect) as well as picking up themes around war, per AFFC. I particularly love how Jaime and Brienne’s relationship unfolded throughout: carefully and slowly, and the themes the author explores for them were pitch perfect and made me ache in the best, bittersweet way. I’ve been thinking about the JB themes (honesty and acceptance and, of course, love and what it looks like for JB) and what the author does with them since I finished it several days ago. Rounding things out: the children…! The dynamics between everyone is so well drawn and interesting and frequently very sweet. I could have read another 25k very cheerfully (25k, T)

Queens of Love and Beauty [AU] this fic is fun and pacey and so swiftly immersive! When Jaime steps in at the last minute for a photo shoot, he’s brought into Brienne’s photo boutique. Delightful setting with lovely characterization and lovelier themes around asserting oneself for oneself. Also there’s a fab through-line about corsets which was very fun and I made audible noises when it played out because it was so satisfying! The author has a light touch mingled with great descriptions of clothes, and lovely character notes and beats. And the romantic tension between JB is very, very cute and wonderfully played. (6000 words exactly which is also very pleasing, T)

#jaime x brienne #braime #fic rec #hie thee to read me!

33 notes · View notes

ladyandtheghost · 5 years

Text

How “The Dany-Show” ruined GoT at the core: 3-point system

1. Sansa vs. Cersei:

How is it possible that we had a million reunions - many of them involving secondary characters for fluff and fan service with zero impact on the plot - but these two women who had so much drama, so much unresolved business, never saw each other again? This is where you would have found the good story to tell and a major plot strand to resolve: the conflict between the Starks and the Lannisters. This is what started it all, this is where it should have ended. This is the story they should have focused on.

So why didn’t they?

Because Game of Thrones was already dead and gone and the series had become The Dany-Show and nothing but The Dany-Show.

Every character, every story arc, everything had to be directed towards Dragon Barbie and her drama. So of course there was no time or space for anything that was not related to the The Dany-Show. Basically a black hole that sucked all the great storylines and characters into its dark void.

Massive loose plot strands like the Stark-Lannister showdown were left to rot, because it was far more important to show off that CGI budget for gratuitous dragon shots and inane conversations between secondary character including sex jokes on the main.

There was literally more screen time allotted to the dragons than to Cersei...

After four seasons of Sansa and Cersei constantly referring to each other and the day they would meet again (willingly or not), it’s scandalous that they shoved so many characters back together for pointless reunions that were more or less blatant fan service (Bronn and the Lannister boys, really?!) but the big conflict, the personal drama that was playing out between Sansa and Cersei - that had actually taken on political dimensions now - did not even get a single scene?

Wrong choice.

I mean can you even imagine how Lena and Sophie would have acted the shit out of their reunion, because I can and it makes me furious that we were robbed of it. When two characters have so much unfinished business, so much foreshadowing and so much history that still isn’t resolved, the least you can expect is to give them at least a half-assed resolution - but we did not even get that, because it had nothing to do with The Dany-Show. Because all the characters have to only think about Dany and relate to Dany and if there is to be a conflict between female characters, it has to involve Dany and no one else.

Poor Lena deserved better than to be reduced to playing a two-dimensional shadow of Cersei Lannister who was little more than a prompt giver to The Euron Greyjoy Side-Show (because sex jokes!)

Also Bonus fuck-up: the prophecy of the YMBQ? Cersei died in the arms of Jaime, if anything Dany’s attack had given her back the one person/thing she cares about. So how exactly did Dany rob her of “all you hold dear” when Dany’s attack caused Jaime to literally drop Brienne like a hot potato, declare his undying love for Cersei and run back into her arms for his final moment?

Before that, Sansa had already “taken” Jaime into her services together with Brienne. He’d actually switched sides to serve “another queen” (just not Dany) and at least this prophecy made sense for two seconds but of course the YMBQ had to be Dany because it’s The Dany Show, whether it makes sense or not...

They just didn’t care anymore, did they?

2. Little...who?:

So we have half a dozen characters rolling up to Winterfell who knew Littlefinger and his dirty business, and Arya, Sansa and Bran are about to go:

Only for some reason: NO ONE asks.

There is not a single reference to the fact that the Stark kids found out that Littlefinger is the mastermind behind 90% of everything that has happened since S1 and that he was executed for this. It’s like it never happened and he never existed and neither did all the important plot points before S8.

Did Jon ever find out that Littlefinger betrayed Ned and conspired with the Lannisters to bring down the Starks?

Did Tyrion ever find out that Littlefinger framed him at the Purple Wedding?

Did Varys ever find out that his nemesis was outsmarted and defeated by three teenagers?

Nope. Nope. And nope.

Ain’t we all?

A character who’s been hailed as MVP by a huge part of the fandom because he knew how to network and play the game™ that is advertised in the title like no other, isn’t even mentioned again. One of the most popular theories re: S8 was (ridiculous as I found it myself) “Littlefinger isn’t dead” because many people felt he was still important to the story and there was also a lot of unfinished business with other characters he was connected to...Jon, Varys, Tyrion, Cersei, Sansa...

Instead, Littlefinger himself, his death and every plot point he was ever involved in was simply erased - because Littlefinger and his relation to these characters had nothing to do with, i.e. did not contribute to...you guessed it...The Dany-Show and therefore POUF, he never existed...

3. R+L = who gives a f***

But you know, these are minor grievances compared to the fact that Jon’s character was not only dumbled down and turned into a complicit in genocide...

Jon’s parentage story arc - you know, THE big revelation and PLOT TWIST - was turned into a side note, a five-minute mini drama that was more about how this will affect poor little Dany and her feelings.

They gave us scenes of Dany waxing on about how Jon’s being the one true king stresses her out because she wants the throne and what she expects him to do about it - but they ROBBED us of the moment Jon tells the Stark siblings that he is not truly their brother, but their cousin.

Because who cares about how Jon feels about this and his “siblings” coming to terms with the fact that:

their father Ned Stark had kept Jon a secret from everyone

that he had not fathered a bastard and betrayed their mother

but saved the one true heir, at cost of his honour,

they lived with the Targaryen crown prince and raised him under everyone’s nose...

No, no, the important thing is how Dany feels about it all and how it affects her.

After the huge build-up, the theories, the overt foreshadowing, even more infuriating - after throwing poor Elia and her children under the bus and making Jon legitimate...

After literally EVERYTHING in this series leading up to the moment when everyone would know who Jon Snow truly is...it had no effect on the story whatsoever, besides contributing to Dany finally revealing the full extent of her insanity (which was only a matter of time anyways)

Heir to the Iron Throne? Targaryen Prince? Rhaegar’s son? PTWP?

The point is: Drama for poor little Dany because her nephew doesn’t want to fuck her anymore is the actual heir.

You can’t even say that it led to her advisors finding out and betraying her because that is something they should have done ages ago, at the latest when she burned the Tarlys. It gave them a legitimate alternative option, yes, but it was not the first time they thought she needs to go...

At least R+L=J served one good purpose: it rubbed Dany’s nose in it that she is not special at all. She is NOT the last Targ, nor the “princess that was promised” - and it was never her destiny to rule, she was only ever the “aunt” of the prince.

Sadly, this is again ALL about Dany and her feelings and how everyone else reacts to her in light of the news that Jon is Aegon.

So R+L=J is not even about Jon in the end, it’s just another element of The Dany-Show. And once Dany is gone, it’s like R+L=J also got erased (just like Littlefinger and the Stark-Lannister-conflict)

...because let’s just send the Head of House Targaryen and last of his line beyond the wall again just because the murderous army of the mad tyrant, whom he heroically freed us from, demands it...and of course we have to wrap up the last five minutes of this shitty episode.

Conclusion:

D&D just REALLY didn’t care anymore once The Dany-Show was over and it’s painfully obvious to see. The good news is that all of these plot points that got erased/dumbled down/ignored^^ are things that are important to GRRM, which gives me hope for the last books at least...

#game of thrones #sansa stark #jon snow #anti-daenerys #anti-dany stans #anti-d&d #cersei lannister

2K notes · View notes

thestory812 · 3 years

Text

A general plea

Please stop attempting to take away Beauty and the Beast from Jaime and Brienne fans. If you want to interpret it to apply to your favs by all means go ahead. I think Beauty and the Beast is a profound, timeless tale that emerges in some way in many romantic stories. Why attempt to take it from us? Besides the fact that I have to bring up AGAIN that it was GRRM who said it and said the subversion was the switched genders not the core of the story (which would no longer make it a B&B story but that’s another matter), we have had to actually watch as our foreshadowed, slow burn relationship (yes even in D&D’s take they were written this way) become canon and then was obliterated in the span of one episode. Then, and this is the best, we had to witness the show and HBO actually try to “uncanon” them and pretend they were never a thing. The show actually declared aired scenes as deleted content. No matter your take or if you like Braime or not you cannot deny this element of the story in both show and novel versions.

#STOP TRYING TO TAKE AWAY BEAUTY AND THE BEAST FROM JAIME XBRIENNE 2021

3 notes · View notes

ziralucas · 3 years

Text

like i don't mean it as a rude thing, because i absolutely love gwendoline christie, but it makes me so upset how pretty they made brienne. brienne isn't beautiful. that's a core element of her character. and i wish they hadn't shied away from that

#got #gwendoline christie #brienne of tarth #game of thrones

4 notes · View notes

zalrb · 3 years

Note

In one of your posts when someone compared them you said that Stiles Stilinski and Seth Cohen were too different to compare or sum. Now i've never seen the oc but after some extensive research (except not at all lol) they seem to be pretty much the same character? Both have the same sense of humor, both extremely loyal to their friends and both getting it on with the popular girl. Now ofcourse i know i'm missing alot in between but could you do a more in depth post about how they are different?

All I’m going to say is I find that people mistake parallels for similarities and don’t look at nuance. For instance, I would not say that Seth and Stiles have the same sense of humour just because they’re both in the same trope as the “funny best friend”

Seth isn’t going to say something like this

Stiles isn’t going to say something like this

Like Stiles is a smartass

Seth is self-deprecating

that may seem like a small difference or semantics but it’s not to me.

Also the whole ‘loyal to your friends’ thing, I frankly find superficial. I don’t know of any character in a show that isn’t on some level supposed to be loyal to their friends, otherwise why is friendship a central element to the show? Even in Gossip Girl, they’re all supposed to be loyal to each other when it counts. Whether or not you feel like the writers do a good job in portraying a particular character’s loyalty is a whole other conversation, so for instance, if people want to dissect Elena’s loyalty to Bonnie and Caroline and whether or not it really exists, that’s fair, but in the writers’ minds, it’s clear that Elena is supposed to be a loyal friend.

So yeah, Seth is loyal to Ryan

and Stiles is loyal to Scott

and Landry is loyal to Matt

like the whole point is that they’re all supposed to be a part of a core group that’s loyal to each other (except Landry and Matt because they’re outsiders)

like, again, every show about friendship

so for me, if loyalty is going to be used as a similarity then it needs to be an actual defining characteristic in both characters.

For instance, in Game of Thrones, Brienne is a character where loyalty is actually a fundamental aspect of who she is,

which is why this was supposed to be a huge deal

Bonnie is exceptionally loyal to Annalise

also Stiles’ relationship to Scott

isn’t Seth’s relationship to Ryan, as in Ryan would be saying this to Seth not the other way around

which is important because it speaks to the different personalities and roles. Also, Dan is witty and dates a popular girl

I wouldn’t say that he’s like Stiles or Seth so basically, my thing is, just because they both operate in the same trope doesn’t mean that they’re the same thing, their details are different.

12 notes · View notes

ginmo · 5 years

Note

I’d very much like to hope this isn’t George’s end for Brienne, and I don’t really believe it is, but a tiny bit of me thinks back to how D&D said they seeded in endgame stuff in S4 because it was the first season after they had that story conference with George and there was so much emphasis on the white book that season. But we’ll never get ADOS so I’ll remain happy in my headcanons.

You know what was also seeded in S4 and even in later seasons after their conversation with GRRM? Their marriage.

4x01: Jaime and Tywin conversation, with Jaime protesting becoming heir because he wants to be near Cersei. Assuming his character has development and will break from her (which he does in canon and should have been starting at that point), “I don’t want a wife, I don’t want children!” would translate into him willingly getting married and wanting to openly father.

4x01: Maybe you’re a Lannister too

4x02: While the Bear and the Maiden Fair is playing in the background, Loras tells Jaime he’ll never marry Cersei and then walks off. When he walks off, Brienne walks past and Jaime looks up at her.

Then we have the whole conversation with Cersei and Brienne, with Bear and the Maiden Fair playing in the background again. The scene establishes that Brienne is in love with Jaime (and CERSEI NEVER FINDS OUT THEY BONE ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME ugh that’s another rant). The Brienne and Cersei scene isn’t direct marriage foreshadowing of course, but when you couple it with the previous scene with Loras, Jaime and the Brienne transition … well.

Also why the fuck would they seed a ONE EPISODE consummation in episode 8 all the way back to the beginning of season fucking 4 (and even back to season 2) if there was no intended meaningful endgame for this relationship? And the best part? GRRM wrote that episode, and we know he wrote those scenes because he mentioned he had to imagine how a Cersei and Brienne encounter would go down.

4x06: Jaime and Tywin conversation, with Jaime showing a bit of growth by agreeing to “marry a suitable woman and father children named Lannister.” He’s essentially choosing Tyrion over Cersei. (so lmfao to their switch from his core being “the things I do for love” to “the things I do for Cersei.”). Considering this is the last conversation he has with his father, with him saying “you have my word,” that gives scene a lot of fucking weight in terms of foreshadowing. YES, the plan didn’t work because Tyrion went crazy during his trial, so he doesn’t have to hold to any agreements he made with his father. But… that misses the point. In that season, Jaime went from totally rejecting any outcome where he’d have to leave Cersei, to choosing his brother’s life over his twin and accepting his role as heir. Because he showed that growth, and this was the last conversation he had with Tywin, it sets up the possibility of him being able to make that decision willingly in the future.

Also, that scene is like a checklist lol. Tywin is telling him to leave the KG, which HE DOES, and then marry a suitable woman to father children named Lannister (oh HEY there’s a Lady Brienne who you just sent on a quest, gifting her with your own fucking sword -a classic literary symbol for love-, who you coincidentally just had a transformative journey with, and who coincidentally just had a scene where it was revealed she was in love with you HMMMMMMM I wonder where this story is going)

5x03: Brienne’s happiest moment. This scene right here is why I LOATH HER ENDING FYI. They really failed at adapting her character to screen, but her ending on the show even sucks WITHIN IN THEIR OWN NARRATIVE and defeats the entire fucking point of her character. (I’m not going to rant about that anymore, but I’ll link you to posts that explains why I hate it. [1], [2], [3] [4]).

Anyway, not only have they been setting up Jaime for marriage, but they also threw this bit in that show’s Brienne isn’t opposed to marriage and being a lady!! She literally says the happiest she had ever been was when the boys wanted to marry her and take her back to their castles. This scene is now completely pointless! Yes, it was to show why she was so devoted to Renly, but they could have written it a million different ways without adapting the romantic rejection element to her arc if they were just going to shit on it in the end? They didn’t have to say she loved the idea of marriage and living that life style? SO LOGICALLY, before the S8 mess, one would think there was a narrative point to throw that in, and that it could be foreshadowing of a marriage between her and Jaime if you add everything up (and for book readers especially since this is also heavily foreshadowed in the books)

5x04: Jaime drooling over Tarth. Seriously, WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THIS SCENE other than to continuously seed his connection to Brienne and possibly foreshadow HIS ENDGAME DESTINATION? Keep in mind they spent loads of money and time on actors to stand around so Jaime can stare at a CGI Tarth. If they wanted to just show that he was thinking of Brienne (again, WHY, if it was meant to be just some half episode fling?!), they could have done it in a way less expensive and time consuming way through dialogue, or him writing her name down on his page of the White Book (WHICH HE DIDN’T DO ON THE SHOW DFGHSLKDJSFGHL) but NO they INTRODUCED THE ENTIRE FUCKING ISLAND I mean….

5x10: Jaime tells Myrcella he’s her father. In the books, it is made clear that Jaime develops a desire to want to father his children, but knows he’s unable to. He even has a thought about how if he has another child he’s going to make damn sure he gets to hold it. This scene is introducing his desire to father, but is now reduced to being completely pointless thanks the S8 and Jaime apparently not caring about having a child. Before the joke of S8, if you add this scene with everything else, it’s a sign that the Tywin Checklist is on its way to completion, just in a way Jaime had not intended.

6x06: There is literally NO REASON for Jaime to leave the Kingsguard, other than to release him from vows so he’s eligible to land, titles, and marriage. He could have achieved the same endgame while never being released from the KG. He could have left Cersei to join the North while still being in the KG/QG. In the books he even runs off with Brienne to help her while he’s still in the KG. Then Tommen says this, “you have served your House and your king faithfully for many years, and you’ll continue to do so, but not in this city.” Keep in mind that a) from a narrative standpoint there is no reason for him to leave the KG unless he’s specifically being set up for marriage and b) we were introduced to Tarth in the previous season.

Then we get the tent scene in episode 8, which isn’t marriage foreshadowing by itself, but it for fucking sure continues to seed that relationship with one of their most romantic scenes (and foreshadowing the bang), almost immediately after he has been released from the KG. Anyone who has the slightest bit of pattern recognition, and able to string clues from a narrative together, can see where this is heading.

7x04: Brienne accepting her title as Lady. Ignoring the fact she doesn’t reject her title in the books, the show has her say over and over and over again that she’s not a lady. We assume this stems from her insecurities and not because she doesn’t want it, because her insecurities are strong in the books and on the show they even established she was happy with the thought of married life in a castle. So obviously there was some sort of confidence boost for her character development on the show, since she’s now accepting her title with a “thank you” and a smile. So… WHAT’S THE POINT of all this Lady Brienne build up for her show arc if the plan was just to have her ditch her title by joining a celibate organization in the end? This was a seed for a very different endgame.

We also have the dragon pit scene where Cersei looks at them TWICE. Again, not marriage foreshadowing, but taking everything into consideration and piecing it all together….

D&D very clearly had an entirely different endgame seeded. I am convinced GRRM told them the Jaime and Brienne marriage endgame, and they seeded it JUST IN CASE they decided to follow through. They’re lazy writers and never cared about properly adapting Jaime and Brienne (I mean, LSH? Adapting literal opposite scenes like the WST?), and they didn’t have a plan after the Red Wedding (they even admitted to not writing stuff that fans started to guess because sHoCk), They threw in only a COUPLE bits of contradictory endgame seeds just to give themselves an out. Towards the end, they decided to go with the out. When did they decided to detour from GRRM and drop it? I’m not sure, but I think they made this final decision when they suspiciously removed Cersei’s miscarriage scene from S7 at the last minute.

Anyway, the scene with Brienne reading his page doesn’t even happen in the books, and IF she winds up as some bodyguard in the end (again HIGHLY DOUBT), it’ll be a completely changed KG that allows love and heirs. In the books it is made clear that Brienne is the heir to Tarth and it doesn’t look like her father is going to have any other children. And again, she definitely doesn’t oppose being a Lady, she just thinks she’s unworthy to be one and unworthy to be his heir because of her insecurities.

#gm answers #also #they even point out she's the heir to Tarth on the show too! LIKE WTF #THEY DID IN EPISODE 2 #BY EMPHASIZING SHE'S AN ONLY CHILD #and WOW excuse my typos #I am still half asleep

416 notes · View notes

jeanandthedreamofhorses · 5 years

Note

You're into ASOIAF too? Oh wow. You certainly made the right call dropping this shitshow -and yeah, looking back, I didn't think it possible to have a worse season than S5 but hooo boy, was I wrong-. Knowing its abomination of an ending now, I'm trying hard not to let it ruin the books for me, too, so take this as a cautionary tale, lol. And bc some positivity would be nice and I do always enjoy reading your opinions, if it's okay, could I ask you about your fave ASOIAF characters and such? thx!

Frick yeah, the question I’ve been waiting for! I can gush about pretty much every character since they’re all so amazingly well written, but for a brief list of the top contenders… (TWOW spoilers ahead!)

5. Asha Greyjoy

“If there are rocks to starboard and a storm to port, a wise captain steers a third course.”

Irreverent, cynical, mocking, confident and dangerous, what’s not to love about Asha? She immediately made an impact with such scenes as her “sweet suckling babe” quip and was one of my favourite side characters in ACOK.

AFFC, however, was when she really got to shine, where to my elation she got a POV chapter, and more in ADWD. Despite her seemingly Ironborn-to-the-core personality, we discover she’s actually one of the least zealous of the Ironborn, sympathetic to the New Ways and those influenced by the culture of the ‘greenlanders’ like Rodrik the Reader. As one of the few reading Ironborn, she’s clearly one of the most intelligent of the Ironborn and certainly more open-minded, which leads to her down-to-earth sales pitch for the Kingsmoot, a sensible, realistic policy which would be genuinely best for her people - while still, of course, maintaining some elements of conquest: she is the kraken’s daughter, after all.

This side to her personality that sympathises with the fringe elements of her society and is able to make realistic assessments of the possibilities of success comes largely from the difficult position of being a prominent woman in the hypermasculine, heavily patriarchal Ironborn culture. Being raised as Balon’s substitute son has landed her more freedom than most Iron women, but in a complicated position nonetheless. She manages to handle it to the best of her ability, however with Balon gone she comes to realise just how precarious her position always was.

Now, like many other characters in ADWD, she is dealing with the hardship of broken dreams. Disaster piles upon disaster for Asha, from the failed kingsmoot to the loss of Deepwood Motte to becoming captive to Stannis (a dynamic I can’t wait to see more of btw, what an interesting clash of personalities!). Like Tyrion, her bravado serves to mask her insecurity, and her sense of powerlessness from recent events - both in commanding her own destiny and the heartache from the ruinous state of her family - really comes out in her inner monologue during ADWD.

How fitting, then, that this is when she reunites with Theon, another character whose lofty ambitions were torn brutally to the ground. Asha lorded it over him in Winterfell, but perhaps now she can relate. Mock as she may, Asha genuinely loves her family, and it’s another appealing aspect of this lonely character navigating her way through her unusual existence on the tightrope of social norms.

4. Tyrion Lannister

“You poor stupid blind crippled fool. Must I spell out every little thing for you? Very well. Cersei is a lying whore, she’s been fucking Lancel and Osmund Kettleblack and probably Moon Boy for all I know. And I am the monster they all say I am. Yes, I killed your vile son.”

Everyone loves Tyrion, and how can they not? He’s one of the wittiest and most intelligent characters in the series, and the first stumbling block when it comes to which side we should root for. While he was always one of my favourite characters from the start, factoring in his complex family life and struggles on account of his dwarfism (and later the maiming of his already ugly face), my favourite part of Tyrion as a character is how all the things we love about him are flipped on their head in ADWD.

Tyrion tells us in AGOT to wear your shame like “armor and it can never be used to hurt you”. It’s an empowering statement, but throughout ASOS we see how insecure Tyrion still is inside, and his ignoble treatment at the hands of his father and the people as a whole in the kangaroo court for Joffrey’s murder, can, ultimately, be boiled down to his being a dwarf. His armour fails him, and he is still utterly unable to be loved, appreciated, or respected by anyone. Only by Tysha, as he finds out, who is now lost to him - ripped from his hands by the machinations of his father and the one family member that Tyrion still loved, his brother.

It’s at this point that Tyrion is never the same again. He murders Shae in cold blood, and he murders his father, and he regrets none of it. He is becoming the monster they said he was.

When we see him in ADWD, the dark side of Tyrion that had always been hidden behind the hope he had clung onto creeps all too shockingly for the surface. His jokes are now too cynical to laugh at, dark and disturbing and cruel. He uses his intellect for no greater good beyond his own personal amusement, deliberately influencing Young Griff to attack Westeros prematurely just in the hopes that his sister might get the axe. He is on no side but his own, acting brazenly irresponsibly as he has no interest in the grand schemes others have set out for him, or even in his own life. The chips on his shoulder are now genuine murderous intent, daydreaming about raping and killing Cersei and mounting Jaime’s head on a spike next to her. Where Tyrion’s whoring habits had seemed roguish and humorous before, in Essos he is depicted raping clearly reluctant sex slaves.

What makes this all the more disturbing, and all the more literarily brilliant, is that it casts aside the biased curtain we had seen Tyrion through before, and the result is shocking. How much more free to consent is a Westerosi prostitute than a Pentoshi sex slave? How worthwhile were the barbed comments he made so frequently when they ultimately led to a litany of testimonies against him as soon as he lost his privileged position? The worse devils of Tyrion’s nature come out in full force, and we see much more of the black of the character Martin described as “the grayest of the gray”. Perhaps the difference now is that Tyrion’s POV lacks a single element of self-love. The readers are repulsed by him in the same way he repulses himself.

Nonetheless, Tyrion seems to be rekindling something of a purpose in ADWD, as characters nurture themselves back up from the wreckage in the aftermath of the War of the Five Kings. He has lost the Lannister’s golden influence, but his silver tongue still serves him well. However, we may never see the old Tyrion again. This Tyrion has not repented for the vile things he has done, or the vile things he intends to do. He was caricatured by the citizens of King’s Landing as an evil advisor whispering into the monarch’s ear - this may become something closer to the truth when he at last meets with Daenerys.

3. Jaime Lannister

“Does my lord wish to answer?” The maester asked, after a long silence. A snowflake landed on the letter. As it melted, the ink began to blur. Jaime rolled the parchment up again, as tight as one hand would allow, and handed it to Peck. “No,” he said. “Put this in the fire.”

Who saw a Jaime POV coming? What an incredible way to open ASOS after the prologue, to see things from the eyes of one of the series’ most notorious villains. I don’t think I need to explain at length how impactful it was to gently peel off the layers of Jaime’s character, revealing the true reason he killed Aerys, his growth in his interactions with Brienne, the embodiment of the chivalric values he abandoned, and most significantly, losing the hand that was his entire identity and vanity. Anyone who has read the book or watched the show can relate.

Since then, he continues to fascinate. He is discovering talents beyond swordsmanship, entering into a negotiation even Tywin could have been proud of. He has learned how to use his bad reputation for nobler ends, scaring Edmure Tully silly enough to end the siege of Riverrun without shedding a single drop of blood. He is still fighting for a Lannister king, true, but that is only staying true to his role as Kingsguard: now that he has lost his sword hand, he is discovering what it means to be a knight again, in an unconventional and thrilling way.

I chose the above quote because it captures the beauty of AFFC Jaime, breaking away from the sister he fought so hard to return to and decisively cutting out her influence for good. In Jaime’s reverse knight’s fable, refusing the call of the damsel in distress is one of the most upright things he has ever done. How fitting that he should then meet up with the woman who influenced him to take the other path - only she seems about to betray him, too…

It will be so interesting to see Stoneheart’s perverted justice on a character whose head we once wanted on a chopping block but now want to survive at all costs. I don’t think Brienne will be able to follow through with it to the end. After all, Jaime must live on to fulfil a certain prophecy…

2. Euron Greyjoy

“The bleeding star bespoke the end,” he said to Aeron. “These are the last days, when the world shall be broken and remade. A new god shall be born from the graves and charnel pits.”

It’s common enough to hear writers and critics talk about how your villain can’t simply be evil, and that they need to have sympathetic motivations or else they’re badly written. I think that’s true sometimes, but only when your evil villains fail to capture the raw horror of what evil really is - that’s when they feel wooden or cartoonish. To successfully capture that heart of darkness, however…

That is what George R.R. Martin achieved with Euron Greyjoy, the most terrifying character I have ever read.

Everyone underestimates Euron. They know he’s mad, but they don’t know how mad he is. They think they can outmanoeuvre him, like Asha, or betray him, like Victarion. They think he’s lying when he says he’s sailed to Valyria and means to conquer Westeros with dragons. Only Aeron knew. Only Aeron knew the depths of Euron’s depravity, and how far he means to fly. Because he’s the only one who heard the scream of the rusted iron hinge.

The Forsaken showed that it was all true, that Aeron was right all along - that he, like the oracle Cassandra, warned the Ironborn but was condemned to be ignored. Euron has an ambition unparalleled by any other character in the series - he means to turn himself into a god. He’s the only one depraved enough to go to the lengths it would take to make that dream a reality.

We should fear Euron, we should fear him very much. And yet, I think his dreams of godhood can never fully come to pass. He is, after all, still a man - still fallible, as we saw him shrink away at the Reader’s reprimand in The Reaver and change his tactics accordingly. His humanity will be the death of him - not any goodness in his heart, but a weakness common to the human creature. The dragons he means to dance with, and potentially the Others too as some theories go, will move at a pace beyond those mortal legs.

His attempt to fly will inevitably end with a fall. But that headfirst plunge will take the Seven Kingdoms with him.

1. Stannis Baratheon

“I know the cost! Last night, gazing into that hearth, I saw things in the flames as well. I saw a king, a crown of fire on his brows, burning… burning, Davos. His own crown consumed his flesh and turned him into ash. Do you think I need Melisandre to tell me what that means? Or you?“

Here is a man so totally dedicated to his duty that he is willing to do whatever it takes to accomplish it, even if it means his own destruction.

He is a character that believes in justice and the word of law more strongly than any other, and watching his dogged persistence to put a corrupt world to rights no matter the odds has always struck a chord with me, especially in this world teeming with such selfish and barbarous characters.

He is not such a performer as other characters, not as openly humorous as Tyrion (though lowkey he has an incredible dry wit), nor as pretty as Renly, nor as lighthearted as Littlefinger. He’s a dour person, hard and unpopular. But if you listen to the conversations he has with Davos, there is an incredible heart to this man who has placed all the troubles of the world on his own shoulders, and strives through cold and stormy weather to make the best, most just decision he can for no other reason than that - because it is just. Justice is hard, sharp and unyielding, not pretty, not humorous, not lighthearted - but necessary. In a king more than anywhere else. That’s why those who do follow Stannis, like Davos, follow him with such faith and loyalty.

He often proceeds about this goal in questionable ways, compensating for the imperfections of his forces and of his own personality. This is the rickety bridge Stannis walks on, as a man who will go to any means necessary to accomplish what he feels must be done. Sometimes this might mean unleashing dark forces better left locked up, sometimes it might mean committing so terrible a sin as kinslaying, sometimes it might mean sacrificing a child to awaken stone dragons - and sometimes it will mean rescuing the realm from a wildling incursion when no other king cared.

Moments like that unforgettable “STANNIS! STANNIS! STANNIS” stick so powerfully in my memory because, much like Jaime, the real virtue of this character had yet to shine so brightly as it eventually would in ASOS. Something which had always been there takes us unawares. And he is evolving, too, ever becoming more flexible, more willing to compromise, more hesitant to burnings, more dedicated to the good of the realm over himself.

And there is a whole other layer of tragic pathos that lies behind his character. Try as hard as Stannis might, and God does he try, he is not Azor Ahai, and every reader knows he will not sit the throne at the end. Even Stannis knows where this road will leave him. But he persists anyway, in the face of death. The courage of that, the self-sacrifice - how can one not be moved by it?

One of the finer points of Stannis that often goes missed in (understandably) overzealous attempts to correct the show’s butchering of his character, is that there is a part of him that does want to be king. He’s lived in Robert’s shadow his entire life, as Asha thinks to herself in ADWD, and there is a part of him that does yearn for recognition. Quotes like “Robert could piss in a cup and men would call it wine, but I offer them cold clear water and they squint in suspicion and mutter to each other about how queer it tastes.” reveal that, I think.

So this is a whole other internal battle within Stannis - he must be careful not to allow his judgement to falter against the part of him that is jealous of Robert, of Renly, that wants to be the hero Melisandre says he is. This very human aspect complicates further the already complicated war between deontological and utilitarian ethics that wages in his head, with Davos and Melisandre as their respective spokesmen. Much as he may want to be a perfect king and avatar of justice - he is still human.

The depth and tragedy of Stannis Baratheon is Shakespearean. My heart shatters in advance for the moment Stannis has made his greatest sacrifice of all to halt the advance of the Others (not the Boltons, he’ll flatten them like pancakes), and for it to do nothing, nothing at all. For him to realise he was never the hero of this story, and that now he has gathered all this blood on his hands where there is no spring to wash them in.

A man so just as Stannis could never forgive himself. But we, the readers, shall never forget the battles he fought as an axle of this universe striving to be something greater.

Honourable Mentions to Aeron, Victarion, Barristan, Jon (Snow and Connington), Cersei and Brienne. Yes, I really like the Greyjoys 🦑.

#asoiaf #asoiaf meta #stannis baratheon #euron greyjoy #jaime lannister #tyrion lannister #asha greyjoy #not snk

123 notes · View notes

the-prophet-lemonade · 4 years

Note

Unpopular opinion time! Malec >>>>>>>> braime, royai, bellark 😈

you’re valid, but royai is the og and that’s just the way of the world my good friend

fandoms come and go but fullmetal alchemist is FOR LIFE

but on a more intellectual level, braime, royai, and bellarke all fulfil the same niche for me, whereas malec is an entirely different dynamic, so they make me happy in different ways.

royai and bellarke especially both fit into the msr paradigm (msr being the fifth of my otps hahahaha) where you have a stoic and intelligent woman who would die for her bit-of-a-moron heart-on-his-sleeve colleague. i’ve talked before about the parallels between scully, hawkeye, and clarke vs. mulder, mustang, and bellamy. braime also fit this dynamic to an extent as brienne and jaime share very similar traits to hawkeye and mustang (she’s hypercapable, he’s a dumbass but with deep emotional scars), and all four of these ships share a “i will follow you into hell” motif and have loyalty as their core value (i guess i just like m/f relationships where the man would literally lay down his life for the woman lmfao)

but malec hits differently. it’s not to say that loyalty and devotion isn’t a cornerstone of their relationship - because it is - but when i break down malec to its fundamentals, i would pick out other things. trust, for example, and this incredible balance they have where they both allow each other to be a leader in their own right and exist and thrive separately from one another. malec also has the transcendent element when you bring in the notions of magic and immortality, and this lends the ship to ideas of soulmates and a sense of “oh, it’s you i’ve been looking for, it’s you i’ve been waiting for”, which i think is different to the above-mentioned ships which are more built on shared trauma and slowly-dissolved tension. malec don’t have that same tension, which i enjoy, because sometimes it’s nice just to see two people fall in love at first sight because their souls align so perfectly.

but still. royai is best

#lucy replies #i've been into fma since 2007 and that's not changing any time soon #arakawa wrote the greatest story and characters of all time and she just can't be topped

6 notes · View notes

sarcasticfina · 4 years

Text

My 2019 Tumblr Top 10

1). 639 notes - 20 May 2019

look, i knew jaime was dead. i still choked up a little at actually seeing him. but i straight up strangle-sobbed when brienne added all of his good deeds to the book. because despite how utterly stupid their ending was with each other, she still saw him for who he really was (and who the writers mercilessly butchered), and she made sure history would reflect that. the only nod to all of the character build-up and redemption he earned is written there on those pages and it came from the only woman to love him for him, who he was at his core, whether he saw it or not. did she deserve better? a thousand fucking percent. and so did he.

2). 119 notes - 08 April 2019

Anonymous said: steve/darcy - "Am I your lockscreen?" "You weren't supposed to see that."

“There something wrong with your phone?” Steve wondered, watching Bucky fiddle around with his phone, tapping at the screen, brow furrowed.

“Huh?” Bucky glanced at him. “No. Just fixing something.”

Steve snorted. “Wasn’t aware there was something wrong with my phone. Care to share?”

“You remember last week, you dug a sketch pad out for the first time in months…”

3). 93 notes - 19 July 2019

Hiatus

Long story short, I broke my ankle and am in a rehab hospital with no wifi. I have limited data and am not sure when I will be back to regular posting/writing. At this point, I’m four weeks out of getting my cast removed but am unsure how much longer rehab will take before I go home, so you might not see me online for a while but I am okay! :)

4). 92 notes - 08 April 2019

Anonymous said: oh you're jealous! - bamon

Bonnie was on her second glass of totally overpriced champagne and it was doing nothing for her. She was the one that talked him into being her plus-one to this gala, which had taken no small amount of pitching, but now she was regretting it. Why? Because the whole point of having him come along was that she would have someone to mutually complain to about the other guests. Only here she was, standing by the buffet, picking at mini quiches and finger sandwiches, while he was over there, being the life of the party. Why was she even surprised? Damon thrived in the spotlight. And given the many middle-aged women currently fawning over him, he was in his element.

Rolling her eyes, Bonnie turned her back on the scene, and picked at a fruit plate.

5). 87 notes - 26 September 2019

medical expenses

so, facing down over $1000 to pay down my medical plan, i’m getting a little stressed. i’m on ei right now, which isn’t quite covering my monthly costs, and i’m about to be returning home from the rehab hospital to do outpatient physiotherapy for a few weeks, which means i’m going to be adding grocery costs to everything else.

anything you can share will help and i’ll be happy to fill fic prompts for my usual ships to anyone who does donate to my ko-fi! just drop them in my ask box and let me know you donated and i will get right on it!

https://ko-fi.com/A666AWP

6). 68 notes - 08 April 2019

Anonymous said: Ooh Starcy, “can you shut up for once in your life?” Thank youu!

“…better for you… keep you safe… don’t want you to be hurt… enemies… don’t know how long… the last thing I would want… don’t think I could forgive myself if… but I have to do what I think is right…”

This conversation had been going on for a while. Too long, really. And the longer it went, the more she could hear her heart pounding in her ears. She was hurt. Confused. But more than anything, she was angry. Which is what she would blame for the next words that came out of her mouth:

“Can you shut up for once in your life?” Her fisted hands sat clenched on her knees as she raised blurry eyes up to see Steve’s surprised face. “You’ve been talking at me for what feels like hours. I don’t need a Captain America speech on all the ways I’m a weakness and how it would be a favor for you to dump me before you run off on some world-saving superhero business.”

7). 61 notes - 09 April 2019

missmeggo929 said: I don’t know if you’ll write it (if not that’s okay), but a little Seth/Kate “Forget it, you’re a fucking asshole.”

He laughed.

And Kate could’ve killed him for it. Immediately, all the excited butterflies that had filled up her stomach and the floaty feeling in her chest evaporated. She pushed up onto her feet, scowled at him, and stomped her way to the door of the hotel room.

8). 52 notes - 03 June 2019

routine kisses - 1/1

It starts innocently enough. Brienne tells him to do something, in that no-nonsense voice of hers, a demand that he help Podrick with something or other. With Brienne, there is rarely a request, more often an order. Jaime finds he doesn’t hate it. He’s indulgent, if anything.

So, he says, rather snarkily, “As my lady commands.” Passing her by, he pops a daring kiss on her cheek, laughing lightly as he keeps walking, far out of reach of her irritable swipe at him. He knows her face is red, that her skin turns cherry against her will, and that warms him even more.

It becomes a game of sorts. When she sends him off with some new task, he finds a way to kiss her cheek before he goes. Sometimes he pretends he won’t or he’s forgotten, but that’s only so she’ll drop her guard long enough that he can sneak in.

9). 51 notes - 12 May 2019

lazy morning kisses - jaime/brienne - 1/1

Should she ask, his excuse is quite simple. He knows her well enough that when she wakes, she’ll startle, make excuses, return to her respectful use of ‘Ser Jaime,’ which is far from how he likes to hear his name spilt from her mouth, not after hearing her heartfelt cries last night. He’s not sure he ever wants to hear her say his name any other way. Rather than wait for her inevitable regret, followed by embarrassment and excuse-making, he chooses to forgo any initial questions about his intentions or desires.

There is no strain, no furrowed brow or frowning lips, when she sleeps. There is only peace. Her face is soft, pale skin and pinkened cheeks and ripe lips. Not pretty, not truly, but beauty is a strange thing. She is magnificent. She always has been. A sight to behold. All too often mocked or overlooked or underestimated. Even he made that folly in the beginning.

10). 45 notes - 08 June 2019

top of head kisses - jaime/brienne - 1/1

At five-and-ten, Duncan was their oldest. He loved books and sword-fighting in equal measure. He was warm and friendly and had his mother’s blue eyes and his father’s handsome face. He was tall, imposingly so, especially for his age. Lanky with broad shoulders and a narrow waist, he looked a far sight more intimidating than he was. For he was still just a boy. On the cusp of manhood, yes, but a boy all the same. He was Jaime’s little boy. The same that he had cradled and sung to and danced around the echoing stone halls of their home when he would not stop crying for anything. The same who proudly proclaimed he was a lion and would roar at people in greeting for the first five years of his life. The same who gripped his father’s stubbed wrist without complaint or revulsion and who agreed that a hook would be more practical than any fancy hand could be. Jaime’s little lion with his still round cheeks, kissed with freckles.

Created by TumblrTop10

#[text]#long post #tumblrtop10 #queue queue ca choo

6 notes · View notes

thebluelemontree · 5 years

Note

Watching JustWrite's videos on 'What Kind of Hero is Batman' on Youtube got me questioning what kind of Hero is Sandor. He feels Romantic, maybe leaning Byronic in some sense but not un-idealistic. What do you think? How about predictions on his arc based on these terms?

I’m a subscriber to JustWrite. If you haven’t discovered it already, I would also recommend Lessons from the Screenplay for quality content along those same lines. Great question by the way. For everyone else, here is part 1 and part 2 of JustWrite’s Batman videos.

Sandor is definitely Romantic with strong Byronic leanings. Moody, introspective, impassioned, psychologically tormented, self-destructive, cynical, an outsider who is at war with society’s hypocrisy, etc. “Mad, bad, and dangerous to know,” was said of Lord Byron. Sandor was written to give a similar impression: deeply troubled and abrasive, yet also sympathetic and philosophically challenging for Sansa. Not to mention, GRRM also understands the cool factor and sometimes sex appeal of that type of character in the literary tradition. Knighthood is Sansa’s gold standard for goodness and excellence, but Sandor hates and rebels against that institution for reasons Sansa can understand and sympathize with. Despite his worst traits, she also comes to view him as a protector, ally, and someone trustworthy to unload on. By understanding the inner workings of his complicated nature, she feels connected to him. The songs never made room for someone like him to exist, but the novelty of the unconventional non-Ser that frustrates and confounds her is, shall we say, highly interesting. He’s definitely kept her up at night thinking. The Byronic type just works well in a young girl’s coming-of-age story for her to meet and conquer a daunting and unpredictable masculine force of nature.

At his core, Sandor is a jaded idealist. This is the point where he and Sansa are in full agreement: that the ideals of knighthood, the vows, the powers granted to the title, the honor of service, should be taken seriously and should mean something in truth. Only one who was once a wholehearted believer in knighthood could have been so deeply wounded by it failing him. He carries that same unflagging contempt for it well into his adulthood. Where Sansa and Sandor differ is how one should live their life in response to a flawed, uncaring, and unjust world. Sandor sees violence and becoming hard-hearted as the only way to protect oneself and survive. While I think GRRM does enjoy employing the Byronic hero in some ways, he’s also showing us it’s kind of wretched and immature way to be. For all his blustering as if he possessed some great philosophical insight, what Sandor does most of the time is stand on the sidelines and deride everything he thinks is lame like an insufferably pessimistic, teenage know-it-all. Sandor characterization abounds in empty threats and macho posturing. I mean, his espoused irrefutable “truth” is capably dismantled by a twelve-year-old demonstrating that the ideals of knighthood still matter when one chooses to live by them. GRRM is not cynical.

As for predictions for Sandor’s arc based on these terms, the Romantic/Byronic hero theme is a major underpinning of my Winds prediction essay on Shadrich, Morgarth, and Byron. Part V gets into the specifics of Sandor’s connection to Lord Byron and his Byronic traits.

I also present the case that his story also contains elements of the folk hero as also mentioned in part II of the video essay. In ASOIAF, GRRM has created in-universe folk hero figures (both real and fictional) like Pate the Pig Boy, Wenda the White Fawn, and the Kingswood Brotherhood. These are heroes that appeal to the smallfolk and merchant classes, unlike the chivalric heroes for the nobility. They either lampoon the powerful and privileged classes or tear them down from their ivory towers. It’s the satisfaction of schadenfreude, and we readers have been waiting for Littlefinger to get his comeuppance, right? IMO, another (better) trickster character is the most well-matched adversary for Littlefinger, there to steal his prized possession from under his nose -- as an unconventional ally to Sansa, not an enemy. I’m pretty much 100% certain that “fox-faced” Ser Shadrich is based on the real-world medieval trickster character, Reynard the Fox, which I explain in the essay. GRRM has sprinkled in enough references to Reynard and other characters/elements from his beast epics for it to be mere coincidence. There’s a purpose to it. The gravedigger persona seems to bear a little resemblance to the character Isengrim, who is a wolf in monk’s robes that isn’t really pious at all. Not that any reference should be taken as an exact one-to-one equivalency, but GRRM does cherry-pick things from other sources that he likes and reworks them for his own story. It’s familiar enough that we should get the basic idea behind it, but we should always be keeping our eye on the story he’s telling first and foremost.

If I can just get around to actually writing it, I have a good deal of notes already made for a companion essay on Sandor’s other in-universe folk hero comparisons. Without going too far down a rabbit hole, let me just highlight one of my main points. Sandor becomes Spotted Pate the Pig Boy when he impersonates an ignorant “poxy peasant” hauling a cart of salt pork to fool a knight that actually knew him so he can smuggle Arya into the Twins. Pate the Pig Boy stories always end well for the hero:

Spotted Pate the pig boy was the hero of a thousand ribald stories: a good-hearted, empty-headed lout who always managed to best the fat lordlings, haughty knights, and pompous septons who beset him. Somehow his stupidity would turn out to have been a sort of uncouth cunning; the tales always ended with Spotted Pate sitting on a lord's high seat or bedding some knight's daughter. -- Prologue, AFFC.

Pate’s adversaries are exactly the kind of people a Byronic Sandor rails against: “the High lords with old names, fat rich men dressed in velvet, knights puffed up like bladders with their honors.” What makes Pate’s victories so sweet and satisfying is that he achieved them without the benefit of lofty education, wealth, social status, beauty, or martial skill. He is simply so underestimated that -- plot twist -- his “stupidity” is actually a cover for his cunning. No matter if tricksters aren’t exactly above-board in their methods, Pate’s a good guy, and he’s upending a system that would keep people like him down. The outbreak of fighting at the RW prevented Sandor from successfully delivering Arya, but then again, his motives at the time weren’t exactly unselfish or “good-hearted.” This is where his redemption arc comes in and how I think all these themes weave together for his re-entry into the story.

What I think GRRM is trying to do is shift Sandor away from the darker aspects of the Byronic/Romantic hero and his adolescent coping mechanisms through his redemption arc. It stands to reason after his humbling and therapeutic stint on the Quiet Isle, he will be reborn as more of a traditional hero, finding value in those knightly ideals again and aspiring to live by them. It’s a choice, one that he need not be anointed to make. Brienne exemplifies that. Nor does he have to adopt a completely different personality. He can still be intense, brooding, and highly critical of an unjust system. It’s just a matter of abandoning the cynicism and replacing it with empathy. He can turn his bite on those who truly deserve it and protect the weak.

There is a lot of other evidence (just look through my Sandor Clegane meta tag) of where his trajectory is most likely headed that meshes well with the hero types and tropes. It’s important to me not just to speculate from a single point, but how everything fits into the big picture, how it serves his character and the POV’s. That’s one of my major pet peeves with a lot of predictions and theories. Even if they aren’t factually off the rails, they tend to have a total disregard for established themes and plot. I know some folks think I’m kinda out there, but I do try to make sure everything I say is in agreement with what we already know, citing textual evidence on all my points. I hope my answer satisfied.

#valyrian scrolls #sandor clegane meta #sandor clegane #asoiaf meta #byronic heroes #folk heroes #trickster characters #traditional heroes #character arcs #pate the pigboy #reynard the fox #twow speculation #my meta #asoiaf theories #my theories #sorry it took so long #real life is a bitch

50 notes · View notes

gascon-en-exil · 4 years

Text

Joining the Game Late: S7E4 “The Spoils of War”

Synopsis

Bronn’s got his eye on Highgarden, and Cersei on paying off all her debts. Littlefinger returns the plot point dagger from Season 1 to Bran and gets creeped out in exchange, but it’s Meera who gets the cold farewell. Arya’s home and has trouble at the door, but she uses her assassin powers to meet Sansa in the family crypt where they bond over wishing they’d killed Joffrey. Bran creeps out Arya too, but he gives her the dagger so she can dual-wield and then show up Brienne in sparring. Littlefinger watches everything in Winterfell. Jon shows Dany the dragonglass and some narratively convenient cave etchings, but Dany’s not going to bend until he does. Hearing about the loss of Highhgarden leads to Tyrion getting the earful he deserves and Dany setting off to burn things against everyone’s wishes. Missandei doesn’t know what a bastard is, and Theon is on Dragonstone again where Jon opts not to kill him. Dickon Tarly is nice enough but has a stupid name, and Bron doesn’t like him. Daenerys and Dothraki hit the Lannister loot train, and Bron loses his gold but pulls a Bard on her dragon. Drogon doesn’t die from the hit, but lands long enough for Jaime to try to be a hero(?). Bron has to pull him out of the way of getting incinerated as Tyrion surveys the devastation.

Commentary

I don’t have an awful lot to say about this episode, so I’ll take a bit of the free space to complain about the costuming this season. Why is almost everyone wearing nothing but black now? I get that everyone is now on Westeros where winter has arrived and so heavier clothes are in order, but winter wear can still be colorful. It’s rather distracting to me to see the whole cast looking so drab for no reason, especially characters like Cersei, Daenerys, and Tyrion who used to have such vibrant and varied wardrobes. Is it supposed to make them all look edgy because the final battle is approaching?

Appropriately given the title, this hour focuses heavily on the material costs - and benefits - of war. Cersei being in arrears to the Iron Bank adds a note of urgency to her desire for conquest that she honestly didn’t really need, but I appreciate that this issue didn’t just vanish after having been brought up once a few seasons ago. Sansa’s ongoing concern for the grain stores of Winterfell continues to manifest although at this stage I’m wondering if it will have any payoff when the battle against the Night King is still a while off. The bounty of the now-defeated Reach is also on display here, the target of a raid by Daenerys as a means of crippling the Lannisters’ ability to withstand a siege in King’s Landing. I’m not entirely clear on the ethics of destroying grain bound for a city soon to be under military siege (not that the concept of war crimes appears to exist in this universe), although despite her scorn of the terrible track record of Tyrion’s “clever plans” it’s interesting to see Dany find a more strategic use for dragon fire that (probably) wouldn’t have her labeled a tyrant by the people of Westeros as Jon and Tyrion fear.

On the flip side, it’s the Starks exemplifying the subject of the more human cost of war. The reunion of the three living siblings forms the emotional core of the episode, even as it’s clear that all of them have changed drastically and in ways that make them inscrutable to each other. This is especially true for Sansa; we as a audience know she’s undergone substantial character development since the beginning of the show, but compared to a stealthy dual-wielding assassin and an omniscient callback device transcending personhood even she seems to feel that she’s being left behind. Knowing how this is going to resolve by the end of the season with Littlefinger, along with whatever his master plan is in remaining with the Starks, is easily the part of the Winterfell storyline I’m most interested in seeing play out. Sansa’s arc being the most mundane (albeit still horrific) of the siblings helps in large part with keeping her as the focal point here even though this technically represents the convergence of a trio of storylines that haven’t had any points of commonality since Season 1.

Don’t think I missed Bronn considering the prospect of Highgarden, though. As humorous as the man can occasionally be, and as competent as demonstrated here, his being named lord of not!Paris in the show’s ending is probably one of its smaller elements that irks me the most. I suppose there’s no one else to give it to since Sam’s going to be a maester, his father and brother are destined for a barbecue, and the show never bothered to include any of the other lords of the Reach, but - Bronn, really?

#Game of Thrones #GoT

2 notes · View notes

goldcnhand · 4 years

Text

// It was inevitable that Jaime was going to return to Cersei. What kind of a brother would he be if he abandoned his sister in her time of need? Speaking strictly upon the shows half (not the books), I believe that Jaime was always going to return. It’s not a black and white situation, though. Not in my eyes anyway.

For me, Jaime is a character who’s arc had always been around his sister. This is a woman he has grown up with and loved since literal birth. Abandoning her when she lied was both from anger and disgust. Jaime gave his word that he would fight beside the North against the wights. He wasn’t going to break that promise, because his character growth doesn’t allow it. But that doesn’t mean he won’t go back to Cersei.

Jaime IS an angry and bitter man. He always will be, even if he lives happily ever after with Brienne, he would have been filled with bitterness towards his life, what he’d done, and his past catching up with him. That’s a part of who he IS and a core element to his character.

But that doesn’t mean Jaime betrayed and left Brienne out of spite, pity or because he didn’t love her. He did. He fell in love with Brienne a long time ago, he just didn’t know it, and how COULD he when he’s been in a relationship with his sister his entire life. He honestly doesn’t know how to court for shit because there’s never been a need to. Jaime’s romantic life was something he never truly explored because there was no need to. He is a CHILD when it comes to how to cope with anything outside of Cersei and his relationship.

What people need to understand about Jaime is that he’s SUCH a complex character. He’s not one sided with Cersei or Brienne. What happened with Jaime was a very complex relationship with someone he’s loved his entire life and never known anything outside of that, to someone he actually fell for by pure accident. They are two EXTREMELY different things.

Cersei and Brienne shouldn’t be some kind of competition. Jaime loves both. He will ALWAYS love Cersei, and I believe he will always love Brienne, too. Without choosing sides (because it’s not that SIMPLE), Jaime is torn between what he’s known his entire life and a chance to CHANGE that, even to escape it. But that’s not EASY. It’s not. For anyone who has been in a toxic and unhealthy relationship, it’s simply not that easy, particularly when you really do love the other person. Jaime knows that he and Cersei are not in a healthy relationship, but why escape it when they both still love each other?

Both of these people have an impact on Jaime and his character, his growth, and where it leads him. I don’t think Jaime left Brienne out of spite or pity AT ALL. He left because that was his SISTER back home who was going to die without him by his side, and how dare he do that to someone he loves. Jaime’s loyalty is so fucking strong and unhealthy that he pretty much knows there’s no coming out of his alive, but even if there isn’t, he’s not going to abandon his sister to die alone. It’s got nothing to do with Brienne and their relationship, it’s got to do with that’s his twin sister there, and that bond is something that is unbreakable.

Disregarding AU’s here, I want it known that Cersei and Brienne will ALWAYS have an impact on the way I write Jaime, and it’s not simple. It’s confusing, it’s grey, it’s complex and psychological. But there was nothing hate filled in his leaving Winterfell, and it was never to HURT Brienne. Jaime is just loyal, and that makes it difficult for him to move on, because he’s all about honour (especially no thanks to Brienne’s influence).

Did he go the wrong way about it? Of fucking course he did, but this is JAIME LANNISTER. He can’t talk about his feelings, he can’t explain them, he just acts, and sometimes he does a terrible job at it. Jaime doesn’t know how to function healthily when it comes to his emotions. He’s just not that simple...

#ooc #headcanons #Meta #// I guess kind of more meta post if anything but this is how I feel about it anyway #// I'm kind of over everyone being it's either Cersei OR Brienne #// No Jaime is NOT that simple a person and nor are his emotions #// Nor is a 30 something long relationship with his twin sister he's known since being in the damn womb with each other #// On this blog we stan both Brienne and Cersei as love interests

1 note · View note

firesign23 · 5 years

Note

I would like to read that very angry post and learn the two rules.

Okay, so, I was GOING to be all “Here are my well composed arguments” about this, but… honestly, I’m still digesting the specifics of Brienne’s story in 8x06 and getting caught up on “Soo, we’re going with the shallowest interpretation of her character’s desires and also kinda just making her Jaime 2.0: The Just Edition” (more on this rant LATER, because oh it was so much worse than I thought when I read the leaks), so instead y’all get a slightly edited version of the Angry Screaming I sent a friend a few days ago. Buckle up, I am Riled.

A pre-rant note–my husband woke up this morning, checked his phone, and looked at me like a man who had Seen Some Shit. “The leaks were right.” He has never watched Game of Thrones (he’s been waiting until the show is done, and I’m pretty sure season 8 killed his plans to binge it), but honestly I can think of no better way to sum up this experience.

(Fucking MOOD, Jon.)

So, first off, I do not expect a lot from Game of Thrones. The visuals are amazing, the actors are top notch, but there have always been issues with the plot, with misogyny, etc. What has made me so ANGRY about this season is that it thumbs its nose at storytelling as a craft. I expected it to be dumb. I did not expect it to be “Wow, my nine year old literally has a better grasp on constructing stories” dumb. #subvertedexpectations (As an aside, I could turn this into a series of rants about the different elements of storytelling and how season 8 fucked them up, but honestly I’d rather lose a fucking hand and I still have a spite fic to write to fix what I can. So we’ll have to content ourselves with this rant, and if husband ever DOES binge the show I’ll save the others as a reward for surviving the experience.)

Second of all, I want to make this clear that any writing rule can be broken (some I don’t believe SHOULD be, which is what started this rant, but they CAN), but you must understand the rules you are breaking and why. And you can’t break all of them at once. I have seen exactly zero evidence this is true for D&D, those talentless hacks.

Now, onto the two rules for character arcs that should never be messed with because they are SO structurally important, and they’ve fucked over both repeatedly throughout season 8:

(1) A character must always want something. They absolutely do not need to GET it, but they need to want it. Hell, NOT getting it is basically the definition of tragedy.(2) A character getting what they want should not result in “Guess their story is over, we can kill them or write them off”

This applies to SO MANY of the characters right now, but I’m going to use Jaime as an example of (1) and Brienne as an example of (2) because honestly that’s the only plot I’ve followed with any enthusiasm. (There are definitely better examples of (2) within the show, but I used Brienne as an example in the original rant and I’m carrying that over. Because Brienne. Fight me.)

RULE ONE: A character must always want something.

Jaime’s arc has been about redemption, about listening to his own morals instead of the poisonous family first that has been dripped in his ear for decades. The setup is all there–a brash kid who is forced to make a call between his own morals (not burning half a million innocent people) and the oaths he made (to protect the king), makes it, and is reviled for it because the truth is never revealed. He falls further into this “Family above all else” mindset because he’s been groomed since childhood for this. There’s like a whole meta post from me in the Lannisters and abuse, but people better than I have gone there before. For this post, “Jaime’s arc is about redemption, a redemption he doesn’t always BELIEVE in but has been a core of his character from season 1” suffices.

His death absolutely should have been about this redemption. Whether he succeeds and kills his sister and lives, or kills his sister at the cost of his own life, or he gets there and the decades of brainwashing means that he falters at the final hurdle… THAT doesn’t matter, so much, but the impetus absolutely should have been DRIVEN by that need for redemption. Have him go south because he needs to save innocents, or even the family of choice (THERE IS A FAMILY OF CHOICE SCENE IN THE FUCKING EPISODE!!!) Hell, have him SEE saving Cersei as redemption. (I mean, that would be fucking stupid beyond stupid, but it wouldn’t insult me on a crafting level.) Just… don’t go “He’s happy, guess it’s time for a relapse we lay no groundwork for, and then handwave with forgiveness from a female character because…she’s so good and pure? We want to pretend we are deep?” There is no tragedy in Jaime’s death because they moved the goalposts at the very last second.

(As an aside, the Very Dear Friend subjected to this rant responded to this portion of my ire with “Why would they do that? It’s so meaningless”, and all I could say was “Because it’s ~*~sHocKinG~*~ that way. NO, YOU BASTARDS. You make it shocking by laying the groundwork and then subverting our hopes at the last second, but THE GROUNDWORK NEEDS TO BE THERE. YOU NEED TO USE OUR CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING OF STORIES.” This was the toned down version of my actual thoughts, because Very Dear Friend is genuinely dear to me and does not need to know the depths of my creative cursing.)

RULE TWO: A character getting what they want should not be the end of their story.

As for Brienne… she is such an interesting character because she’s SO driven by her own morality. She wants, desperately, to be a knight. Not just BE knighted, but to embody the spirit of knighthood. She gets that knighthood from someone she respects, deeply–she’s one of the few people who truly knows about Jaime’s struggle with morality vs oaths and has utter faith in him–and so she gets what she wants. Great, right? WRONG. We are at Unbreakable Rule #2–a character who gets what they want should not then have nowhere to go.

NB–the original rant here was far more articulate and focused on how this rule is broken, but we might descend into slathering rage instead. Because the ending (oh god, seriously, like I said, I’m still digesting the depth of the shit in this because on a surface level it seems happy but it’s really fucking terrible) puts her in this horrible stagnation that is more focused on title than her actual character. She didn’t necessarily want to be a Kingsguard, she wanted to be a Kingsguard for a king she believed in. And, like, she had a say in electing Bran? (Rereading this rant--that’s a weird phrasing. I’ll deal with it later) But that whole thing makes no sense (“I can’t be lord of Winterfell because I’m the Three Eyed Raven, but I can totally be King” ??? I just… honestly, my brain is not computing this well.) and I just… CAN WE FUCKING TALK ABOUT HOW SHE HAS PREVIOUSLY PLEDGED HERSELF TO PEOPLE WHO ARE IN SOME WAY VULNERABLE??? Seriously, who has she pledged oaths to before now? A gay man and women. Because that was always fucking important to me, and this is just… no.

The ending as it is basically just makes her Replacement Jaime–a highborn heir who instead takes the role of Kingsguard, but don’t worry guys she’s so Noble and Caring that she absolves Jaime of his sins by writing his story in the book. Where’s the fucking vomit emoji? (Don’t get me wrong, that scene is emotional and moving and honestly FUCK YOU GWENDOLINE CHRISTIE FOR BEING SO LOVELY AND TALENTED, but in the wider context of this show I just cannot see it as a good thing.)

I just… look, in my rant a few days ago I’d read the leaks, but I still had some hopes the ending would be better on screen; right now I can’t even articulate the number of levels it bothers me on, so just know that I SHOULD HAVE BEEN FUCKING HAPPY WITH HER ENDING! But I’m not, because it is this surface level understanding of what she desires from knighthood, and there is this… okay, so, I’m articulating this TERRIBLY because the original rant was solid but did not account for fuckery, but you know what Brienne’s ending made me think of? Nikolaj Coster-Waldau’s interviews where he would fight for Jaime’s character and basically get told to shut up and follow the script. THAT is what Brienne’s ending feels like to me, and it shouldn’t. She should have places to GO and GROW from here. Like, there are SO MANY things they could do with these characters that are surprising. Hell, imagine Brienne getting this knighthood and then getting presented with a similar situation to Jaime–does she keep an oath or to her own morals? Make it a smaller scale so that the answer isn’t so simple, have knighthood become shades of grey she never really understood–she gets what she wants, but it’s not simple. Boom, her story will go on after the end credits.

(I also have Capital I Issues with the narrative surrounding her love life and gender and… seriously, this could have been a motherfucking SERIES of rants. I could do a week’s worth just on how they did Brienne dirty)

RULE THREE: If you make me spend over an hour trying to present a coherent explanation for why your writing sucks and I’ve barely scratched the surface, you don’t get to write anything ever again. Sorry, I make the rules and I have decreed it so. All in agreement, raise your hand.

#I don't even go here #game of thrones spoilers #writing #Brienne of Tarth #(and my heart)#Jaime Lannister Deserved Better #(still a fucking tag)#(though that one scene was A Lot To Digest)#game of thrones #you can break writing rules #BUT YOU HAVE TO UNDERSTAND WHAT AND WHY YOU ARE BREAKING THEM #or keep it between yourself and the 10 other Angsty White Dudes in your Creative Writing 101 class

21 notes · View notes