The Wild Blue Rose: Who Was Lyanna Stark?

Beautiful, and willful, and dead before her time

Lyanna Stark. The L in R+L=J. The woman whose memory Robert Baratheon fought for and cherished until the end of his days. A beauty of the seven kingdoms, a maid with blue winter roses in her hair. A wild she-wolf of Winterfell who longed for her own future and adventure. Her life and her flight from marriage brought an entire country into civil war, and her legacy continues to shape Westeros to the current day.

Much like her husband Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, she is a character wrapped in mystery, yet understanding who she was and wanted to be is crucial for knowing the future of Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire. Who was Lyanna Stark, and why did she run away with Rhaegar?

As with Rhaegar, let’s start with the basic facts of her life. Some of this information comes from the books and may not be included in the show.

Lyanna was born in 266 AC, 7 years after her future husband Rhaegar, as the third child and only daughter to Warden of the North and Lord of Winterfell Rickard Stark and his wife Lyarra Stark. Lyanna was born and raised in Winterfell. She had a reputation of having “wolf blood” and was known as what we would call a tomboy today. Lyanna loved fighting, riding, and playing like one of the boys with her brothers Brandon, Ned, and Benjen. Years after her death, she is still known in the North for her incredible skill riding horses.

Arya was breathing hard herself then. She knew the fight was done. “You ride like a northman, milady,” Harwin said when he’d drawn them to a halt. “Your aunt was the same. Lady Lyanna. But my father was master of horse, remember.” – A Storm of Swords, Arya III

Brandon was fostered at Barrowton with old Lord Dustin, the father of the one I’d later wed, but he spent most of his time riding the Rills. He loved to ride. His little sister took after him in that. A pair of centaurs, those two.  – A Dance With Dragons, The Turncloak

Horses… the boy was mad for horses, Lady Dustin will tell you. Not even Lord Rickard’s daughter could outrace him, and that one was half a horse herself.  – A Dance with Dragons, Reek III

This flashback from season 6’s “Home” of Lyanna and her brothers shows much the same. She shows off her skill at riding, gives Wylis (later known as Hodor) tips on how to beat her brothers, and participates in the boys’ games.

This scene is very similar to one shown in Season 1, Episode 1, “Winter is Coming,” where Arya, so much like her aunt years earlier, shows up her own brothers in the practice yard too.

Much of the details of Lyanna’s life comes from the memories of her older brother, Ned. Unfortunately for viewers of Game of Thrones, many of these scenes have been cut as they are his internal thoughts. Much like Rhaegar in my previous feature, it is difficult picturing a character we know so little about. It helps if you think of Lyanna as a more grown-up version of Arya Stark. Ned very early on draws these comparisons between Arya and Lyanna in contrast to the images we get of her in the show. 

Her father sighed. “Ah, Arya. You have a wildness in you, child. ‘The wolf blood,’ my father used to call it. Lyanna had a touch of it, and my brother Brandon more than a touch. It brought them both to an early grave.” Arya heard sadness in his voice; he did not often speak of his father, or of the brother and sister who had died before she was born. “Lyanna might have carried a sword, if my lord father had allowed it. You remind me of her sometimes. You even look like her.”

“Lyanna was beautiful,” Arya said, startled. Everybody said so. It was not a thing that was ever said of Arya.

“She was,” Eddard Stark agreed, “beautiful, and willful, and dead before her time.” – A Game of Thrones, Arya II

But that was not all there was to Lyanna; she also was like her other niece Sansa. Lyanna loved flowers and music, particularly the blue winter roses that grew in the gardens of Winterfell. Long after her death, Ned would bring those same blue winter roses and lay them on her statue.

Her brother Ned was fostered in the Vale of Arryn with a young Robert Baratheon under the watch and tutelage of Lord Jon Arryn. Ned and Robert became as close as brothers. The two schemed that they truly could be brothers if Robert married Ned’s sister. Ned suggested the match and Lord Rickard Stark agreed. The young Lord of Storm’s End and Lyanna Stark were bethrothed. However, and this is critical for understanding her, no one asked what Lyanna thought of her future being decided for her, or took her opinion into account.

We know this because Lyanna expressed doubts about the match. She had never met Robert Baratheon before but knew him by reputation. She was no fool, and he had the same reputation for womanizing in his youth that he did later as king.

Robert will never keep to one bed,” Lyanna had told him at Winterfell, on the night long ago when their father had promised her hand to the young Lord of Storm’s End. “I hear he has gotten a child on some girl in the Vale.” Ned had held the babe in his arms; he could scarcely deny her, nor would he lie to his sister, but he had assured her that what Robert did before their betrothal was of no matter, that he was a good man and true who would love her with all his heart. Lyanna had only smiled. “Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature.”  – A Game of Thrones, Eddard IX

She spent most of her life as if she would end up as Brienne of Tarth, a warrior woman clad in armor traveling the Seven Kingdoms with a sword at her side. Drastically her future changed from a wolf running through the forests of the North (like her son would one day) into being the lady-wife of a stranger in the damp, dreary, foreboding castle of Storm’s End while her husband bedded every woman he could. Robert and the life he offered was not one she wanted. But, Lord Rickard had spoken, and the betrothal moved forwards.

Robert never really knew Lyanna, demonstrated here in the first episode at her tomb. Robert gave her a feather and wanted her buried on a sunny hill. Lyanna loved blue flowers and requested to be buried in the crypts. Robert knew and loved Ned as a brother- but the same can’t be said for his “beloved” Lyanna. The future king loved the idea of Lyanna not the real person.

The next major event in Lyanna’s life was the famous Tourney at Harrenhal. Many remember it for the sheer number of lords and ladies from all corners of Westeros who showed up on the shore of the God’s Eye. In the show, Harrenhal was shown as a dreary ruin. Yet in those days, when held by House Whent, it was a spectacular sight. Banners of every lord streaming above the ground, heroes and knights clashing in the jousts and melee, and lusty cheers for the Silver Prince Rhaegar above all. But, in the middle of the pageantry, there was Lyanna, her brothers, Howland Reed (you may remember him from the Tower of Joy), and a mystery knight known only as the “Knight of the Laughing Tree”. It’s a major story related to Bran Stark by Jojen and Meera Reed left out of the show thus far (except for the season 6 Histories & Lore). To quote the Reeds:

“Sometimes the knights are the monsters, Bran. The little crannogman was walking across the field, enjoying the warm spring day and harming none, when he was set upon by three squires. They were none older than fifteen, yet even so they were bigger than him, all three. This was their world, as they saw it, and he had no right to be there. They snatched away his spear and knocked him to the ground, cursing him for a frogeater.”

“None offered a name, but he marked their faces well so he could revenge himself upon them later. They shoved him down every time he tried to rise, and kicked him when he curled up on the ground. But then they heard a roar. ‘That’s my father’s man you’re kicking,’ howled the she-wolf.”

“A wolf on four legs, or two?”

“Two,” said Meera. “The she-wolf laid into the squires with a tourney sword, scattering them all. The crannogman was bruised and bloodied, so she took him back to her lair to clean his cuts and bind them up with linen. There he met her pack brothers: the wild wolf who led them, the quiet wolf beside him, and the pup who was youngest of the four.

“That evening there was to be a feast in Harrenhal, to mark the opening of the tourney, and the she-wolf insisted that the lad attend. He was of high birth, with as much a right to a place on the bench as any other man. She was not easy to refuse, this wolf maid, so he let the young pup find him garb suitable to a king’s feast, and went up to the great castle. – A Storm of Swords, Bran II

Screenshot from Season 6 Histories & Lore, “The Great Tourney at Harrenhal”

Lyanna, angry that squires would hurt her father’s bannerman in Howland, beat them back with a training sword and offered him the courtesy of the North. This is the Lyanna the North knew. Fierce, brave, and not afraid to swing a sword. As for the music I mentioned earlier:

“Under Harren’s roof he ate and drank with the wolves, and many of their sworn swords besides, barrowdown men and moose and bears and mermen. The dragon prince sang a song so sad it made the wolf maid sniffle, but when her pup brother teased her for crying she poured wine over his head. –  A Storm of Swords, Bran II

Prince Rhaegar, known for his harp-playing and singing, performed for the lords and even Lyanna cried at his song. It’s here, in this night, the connection between the eventual husband and wife began. However, this is only how Lyanna noticed Rhaegar. What made him notice her among all the other ladies at the tourney? That came next in the jousts, and the Knight of the Laughing Tree:

“Whoever he was, the old gods gave strength to his arm. The porcupine knight fell first, then the pitchfork knight, and lastly the knight of the two towers. None were well loved, so the common folk cheered lustily for the Knight of the Laughing Tree, as the new champion soon was called. When his fallen foes sought to ransom horse and armor, the Knight of the Laughing Tree spoke in a booming voice through his helm, saying, ‘Teach your squires honor, that shall be ransom enough.’ Once the defeated knights chastised their squires sharply, their horses and armor were returned. And so the little crannogman’s prayer was answered . . . by the green men, or the old gods, or the children of the forest, who can say?”

It was a good story, Bran decided after thinking about it a moment or two. “Then what happened? Did the Knight of the Laughing Tree win the tourney and marry a princess?”

“No,” said Meera. “That night at the great castle, the storm lord and the knight of skulls and kisses each swore they would unmask him, and the king himself urged men to challenge him, declaring that the face behind that helm was no friend of his. But the next morning, when the heralds blew their trumpets and the king took his seat, only two champions appeared. The Knight of the Laughing Tree had vanished. The king was wroth, and even sent his son the dragon prince to seek the man, but all they ever found was his painted shield, hanging abandoned in a tree. It was the dragon prince who won that tourney in the end.” A Storm of Swords, Bran II

With Lyanna’s martial prowess, her skill at riding, and her fearlessness, many in the fandom have come to the conclusion that the Knight was actually Lyanna in disguise. The Knight specifically called out the knights whose squires had been bullying Howland and were chased off by Lyanna. The Knight also was extremely skilled on their horse and unhorsed mighty lords and knights as if they had been doing it for years. Which, coincidentally Lyanna had been, as she trained with her brothers for years, daring her father to make her stop. And in the line, “Even sent his son the dragon prince to see the man,” many have further speculated that not only did Rhaegar find the Knight as commanded, he unmasked the knight only to find Lyanna- the same pretty young girl who had cried at his songs during the feast. Rhaegar did not turn in Lyanna, but instead gave her the crown of winter roses meant for his wife Elia Martell. This gesture was interpreted by those at the tourney as romantic. The champion of a tournament was allowed to declare anyone his “Queen of Love and Beauty”. Most wedded lords and knights give the honor to their wives. Not Rhaegar, and all the smiles died. Littlefinger explains the offense well to Sansa in this scene from the crypts of Winterfell in front of Lyanna’s statue.

A common misconception is that Rhaegar and Lyanna left together from this tourney. On the contrary, from the end of the tourney to their eventual disappearance, almost 8 months passed. Lyanna was on her way for her oldest brother Brandon’s marriage to Catelyn Tully (Ned’s eventual wife) when the infamous abduction happened.

As mentioned before, those on the side of the Starks and Baratheons insist that Lyanna was kidnapped, that Rhaegar was a mad dragon who abducted their beloved sister and Robert’s fiancee. Those on the side of the Targaryens insist that Rhaegar and Lyanna loved each other, having met at the tournament and citing his lack of passion for Elia, and ran off together in a romantic gesture.

Whatever the truth may be, this caused Brandon Stark to ride to King’s Landing and call for Rhaegar to “come out and die” to his father’s face. This ill-advised act led to his execution along with his father, leading to Robert’s Rebellion. Robert was betrothed to Lyanna, and after the death of Rickard and Brandon, he started a war to reclaim her from Rhaegar and depose King Aerys for his crimes.

In the TV show, it has been revealed in the season 7 finale that Rhaegar and Lyanna ran away together in passion, eventually marrying in Dorne.

However, even without that scene, if we take into account what we know about Lyanna, it is perfectly understandable that she did indeed run away with the crown prince of her own free will. Her wild and adventure seeking nature, her apprehension about marrying Robert Baratheon, how she wanted a future she determined. Rhaegar was handsome, intelligent, powerful, a master of the harp and song,  and unlike other suitors, had seen Lyanna not as the daughter of Lord Rickard Stark, Ned’s sister, but as she truly was.

“You never knew Lyanna as I did, Robert,” Ned told him. “You saw her beauty, but not the iron underneath. She would have told you that you have no business in the melee.”  – A  Game  of Thrones, Eddard I

However romantic, their elopement was ill-advised. Robert wasn’t just her betrothed, he was a hot headed lord of an entire kingdom with powerful, loyal friends and an army at his back. Rhaegar was already married to Elia Martell, the sister to the Prince of Dorne, and had two children with her. Lyanna’s brother Brandon’s antics in his young life made Lyanna look positively docile, from deadly duels to womanizing his way around Westeros. Rhaegar’s father King Aerys was paranoid on his best days and murderous on his worst days. These were extremely powerful and dangerous people that had enormous personal stakes in Rhaegar and Lyanna’s futures. And Rhaegar and Lyanna left them all behind anyway.

Rhaegar and Lyanna disappeared into the wilderness, with only Rhaegar re-appearing around 8-9 months later to take his place at the head of the Targaryen army. In those months, it’s likely Rhaegar took her all over Westeros. Places like his family’s destroyed palace of Summerhall, the magnificent castle Starfall that has housed the Daynes since the Dawn age and home of Rhaegar’s best friend Arthur, the obsidian caves on Rhaegar’s home of Dragonstone, the weirwoods of High Heart- and we know the eventual end of the journey was  at the Tower of Joy in the mountains of Dorne. It is here, at this tower, that Ned eventually found Lyanna guarded by Aerys’ Kingsguard members Arthur Dayne, Gerold Hightower, and Oswell Whent (the last one present only in the books).

A large unanswered question about their relationship though is how much Rhaegar told Lyanna about his beliefs about how he or his children were the saviors of Westeros. The pair spent months together traveling through the wilds of Westeros and in Dorne and, for his many faults, Rhaegar seemed to be much more in love with Lyanna than he ever seemed to be with Elia. And with Elia, Rhaegar spoke openly about these beliefs. It appears likely that he did tell his Lady Lyanna what he was doing with his life.

Will you make a song for him?” the woman asked.

“He has a song,” the man replied. “He is the prince that was promised, and his is the song of ice and fire.” He looked up when he said it and his eyes met Dany’s, and it seemed as if he saw her standing there beyond the door. “There must be one more,” he said, though whether he was speaking to her or the woman in the bed she could not say. “The dragon has three heads.” He went to the window seat, picked up a harp, and ran his fingers lightly over its silvery strings. Sweet sadness filled the room as man and wife and babe faded like the morning mist, only the music lingering behind to speed her on her way.  –  A Clash of Kings, Daenerys IV

However, Lyanna never mentioned it. In her final moments and dying in her bloody bed, Lyanna asked Ned to promise her that he’ll protect her newborn child from Robert’s wrath, and in the books, raise him as Ned’s own and bury her in the crypts of Winterfell along with her pack. Robert had turned into a raging demon during the war, promising death for all Targaryens. She had good reason to believe that Robert would kill her child once he found out Rhaegar was the father.

In the books, it is nearly identical with no acknowledgment that she knew what Jon would become.

I was with her when she died,” Ned reminded the king. “She wanted to come home, to rest beside Brandon and Father.” He could hear her still at times. Promise me, she had cried, in a room that smelled of blood and roses. Promise me, Ned. The fever had taken her strength and her voice had been faint as a whisper, but when he gave her his word, the fear had gone out of his sister’s eyes. Ned remembered the way she had smiled then, how tightly her fingers had clutched his as she gave up her hold on life, the rose petals spilling from her palm, dead and black. After that he remembered nothing. They had found him still holding her body, silent with grief. The little crannogman, Howland Reed, had taken her hand from his. Ned could recall none of it. “I bring her flowers when I can,” he said. “Lyanna was … fond of flowers.” A Game of Thrones, Eddard I

Ned kept his promise; Lyanna’s child was kept hidden as a bastard named Jon Snow and her body interred in the crypts with her family.

Lyanna’s story, like Rhaegar, is one of intense tragedy and mystery. Was she a young girl (only 15-16 at the time of her death), seduced by an older man and in way over her head? Do Rickard and Ned share blame for trying to take a free spirit like Lyanna and lock her into an arranged marriage against her wishes? Did she buy into Rhaegar’s theories about the future? What would she think of Jon today and all the hardships he has endured and overcome? Why didn’t she write a letter to her family explaining that she wasn’t kidnapped? If she did, what happened to it? What did she think of Elia and her two children that Rhaegar choose to abandon? How much of the responsibility does she share with Rhaegar for the wars and suffering that followed their escapade?

Many fans also believe that Lyanna was referenced along with Rhaegar in Daenerys’ visions in the House of the Undying, in A Clash of Kings.

A blue flower grew from a chink in a wall of ice, and filled the air with sweetness. . . . mother of dragons, bride of fire . . .

Her own favorite blue winter rose growing from a chink in a wall of ice, a mother of a dragon in Jon, and the bride to Rhaegar’s fire.

We can only hope that Lyanna would be proud- of her brother for keeping her promise and Jon’s secret until his death, and of her son for leading men against the hordes of the dead and the endless winter Rhaegar knew was coming. It’s a tragedy that she died so young and so far from home, but she lives on in Jon: Lyanna’s son blooming at the Wall like her favorite flower, and his song is ice and fire.

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Lena Headey on what Cersei really thought during Daenery’s Dragonpit entrance

The post Lena Headey on what Cersei really thought during Daenery’s Dragonpit entrance appeared first on Winter is Coming.

Via https://winteriscoming.net/2017/08/31/lena-headey-on-what-cersei-really-thought-of-daenerys-arrival-at-the-dragonpit/

Glass Candle Dialogue Season 7, Episode 7: “The Dragon and the Wolf”

This last day of August, it’s with with a mixture of geeky enthusiasm and poignancy that Petra and I delve into the almost feature-length Game of Thrones season seven finale. We dissect character motivations, resolutions and cliffhangers, Petra nitpicks a bit about chains and we both question the enduring merits of plot twists.

Petra: We should probably start with the obvious: The Dragonpit!

Luka: That was certainly the greatest number, and perhaps highest quality, of character interactions in the long history of this show. And that’s saying something!

Petra: They did a really good job balancing the reunions with important dialogue, without it feeling fan-servicy or inorganic. Except for Grey Worm, who stayed outside the city walls and had no lines; Jacob Anderson deserves better next season!

Luka: Still, the old gang is back together again, with Tyrion, Bronn, Pod, and Varys; proud uncle Sandor and aunt Brienne discussing their murderous little wolf girl; and we witnessed the grand finale to the dwarf jokes, with Tyrion and Theon discussing the merit of Euron’s joke, which gave us a refreshing lighthearted Theon moment.

Petra: He smiled! We got quite a few Theon smiles this episode. And Brienne and Sandor were great. Their interaction was a purely character moment. It didn’t inform the plot; and it didn’t need to. But then we had that balanced out with Brienne’s conversation with Jaime about politics and decision-making, for example. There was no time to talk about the past, but they still got to share screen time.

Luka: It didn’t stop the plot. Once at the Dragonpit summit, the character work was limited to the subtext of all the conversations. They brought forward the purely character-focused scenes to the moments before the big meeting. Any exchange that wasn’t crucial to the plot was placed before the summit, except for Sandor confronting his brother, but that interruption fit the character. By the way: the general consensus seemed to be that Cleganebowl was either going to happen or be denied to us for good in the finale, but instead we got a middle-ground —a prelude to Cleganebowl.

Petra: GET HYPE… for season eight.

Luka: Cersei didn’t even flinch at Drogon and we could see how much effort that took. Meanwhile, Euron appeared to still be keen on Dany and her dragons. That may be a setup. Euron ended the season as well as he began, didn’t he? What a makeover!

Petra: It was undercut later, but the funniest shot of the episode had to be Euron matter-of-factly strolling away after seeing the wight. “Okay, bye-bye, I’m leaving now.” Yes, it was a ruse, but I felt it was a very Euron thing to do.

Luka: Dragons are one thing, especially when you steel yourself to see them, but undead monsters are another. Especially if the undead monster radiates such personality…

(GIF by Joanna Robinson for Vanity Fair) Petra: I like to imagine Jon and Sandor measuring the length of the wight’s chain ahead of time, to perfectly figure out how to get the wight as close to Cersei Lannister as possible without actually biting her head off, for maximum effect. That’s my headcanon.

Luka: Oh, man. Another fucking episode with a chain-related nitpick. [Laughs]

Petra: [Laughs]

Luka: It seemed quite convenient for the chain to be that long. But if you actually look at the next shot, the chain was much, much longer. It was Sandor pulling it!

Petra: Oh, okay, wow!

Luka: I guess I’m just the defender of Game of Thrones chains. Now, about Tyrion’s chain during the Battle of the Blackwater being cut from the show…

Petra: [Laughs]

Luka: Anyway, Cersei looked truly horrified when she saw the wight. Death stared her in the face, and that truly makes you believe the armistice may work after all.

Petra: I like getting to see Cersei shaken as a zombie snaps at her face, because she’s usually so self-contained. But I’m wondering about something. I’m a bit confused here. My initial reading of Tyrion and Cersei’s conversation was that he got her to reconvene the meeting by playing to her concern for her unborn child, is that right?

Luka: At least that’s the excuse. We later find out it was a ruse.

Petra: Cersei’s and Jaime’s interactions were very interesting, but at first, it seemed that Cersei now defines her worldview around her new child, that it’s all that matters to her. If making peace with her enemies is what’s necessary to make sure her baby comes to term, then that’s what she’ll do. Then she completely went against that later?

Luka: Cersei’s fake turn was much more believable than I expected it would be, honestly. So much so that it was a real shock when she revealed it was all a lie. But it still made sense: it’s not that she doesn’t have a plan for herself and her child, it’s that her plan doesn’t include the North. Either the White Walkers kill the Northerners and Daenerys, or the other way around. Either way, she may face one weakened army instead of two.

Petra: Still, after a season of Cersei focused on “we fight and die or we submit and we die,” when Tyrion realized she’s pregnant and appealed to her familial love, a new element was introduced into her thought process. But it turned out that wasn’t the case.

Luka: Similarly to how I believe that Euron really was afraid for the first time when he saw the wight, I do believe that Cersei’s feelings about her baby weren’t false. She said as much in her argument with Jaime. She can reconcile the protection of their baby with her plan to let the war in the North dispatch one of her enemies.

Luka: Of course, I also appreciated Jaime realizing Cersei is as mad as he feared.

Petra: The thing that finally got him to leave her, really, was her turning against him.

Luka: I’d say it was Cersei turning against his oath, rather than her threatening his life.

Petra: There were a lot of momentous character decisions and developments this episode, but they were all rooted in previously established traits. For Jaime, his final break away from Cersei was two-fold: she broke her oath, and if he continued to follow her he would have to have broken his too; and she turned against him. He was preparing to leave, and she said “I told you no one walks away from me.”

Luka: That was so cold. And the moment Jaime saw her for who she’s been all along.

Petra: I feel like he’s been making that reaction face from The Office all season, but it was really when Gregor unsheathed his sword that Jaime gave up on Cersei (the moment perfectly captured in the picture above.) I don’t believe he was ever really going to be the one to let go first. She had to give up on him for him to be able to leave her.

Luka: Their relationship was the only thing that kept him there, so when she demonstrated something we all knew about her but he didn’t, that he loves her more than she loves him, he was finally able to walk out. She didn’t just threaten his life, though that’s obviously dire, but his oath too. I don’t know about you, but when he was arguing with Cersei, I could see Brienne’s words from earlier echoing in his mind.

Luka: As for Brienne and Jaime, he pointedly tried to ignore her for most of the summit. It’s as if he was trying to ignore his conscience, until it caught up to him in the form of Brienne. She got through to him, even though he resisted at first, especially with Cersei present. All those looks between the three of them were wonderfully awkward.

Petra: Brienne’s saying “fuck loyalty, fuck oaths, nothing else matters except the battle between the living and the dead” was such a transgressive thing to say for her character, which is why it highlighted the importance of this matter to Jaime, and that’s what he was trying to convey to Cersei later. So yes, Brienne brought out his best self.

Luka: Their relationship has always been slow-going and sporadic, but it’s just so damn beautiful. I’m really curious to see how it will develop now that Jaime’s going North. Aside from Tyrion, I imagine Brienne will be the only one to vouch for him.

Petra: You described Jaime a few episodes ago as being under Cersei’s spell. It felt frustrating to me that apparently nothing Cersei did could ever get him to break away from her, because when it all came down to it he was still so utterly enthralled to her.

Luka: She had to break the spell herself.

Petra: That’s it! So we finally got to see Jaime break away from Cersei. And it was coupled with that montage of snow falling in King’s Landing. Absolutely lovely.

Luka: We should probably talk about Jon, since the entire Dragonpit Summit was his scene, in a way. He’s been talking about this for years, trying to convince everyone, anyone. And now, at long last, Jon got to make his case to the rulers of Westeros, demonstrating his role as a uniter of men. I imagine he’ll get a lot of flack for being honest with Cersei about bending the knee to Daenerys, but he was right: whatever they may say about honor getting Starks killed, lying at this point will only make things worse. Imagine Cersei did bring her armies North. If at some point she realized Jon didn’t intend to stay neutral later, that’d probably destroy the alliance. So he had a point.

Petra: I’m not gonna lie: when he said he couldn’t stay neutral, I yelled at the screen. Popcorn may have been thrown at it, too. But then Tyrion chewed him out about it; Daenerys discussed it with him; and later the value of honesty was Theon’s segue into their conversation about how each of them honored Ned’s memory. And yes, Jon made a good point: if you keep on lying, words stop meaning things, and you just get better and better lies. So, provided that it was the insufferably honest Jon Snow being insufferably honest, it was a decision that was rooted in his character, and it was addressed as the controversial decision that it was. It wasn’t framed as the hero being heroic and fixing everything. He didn’t fix anything. So it was compelling, rather than annoying.

Luka: Surprisingly, except for the later sex scene, Daenerys only got one character-focused scene in the finale, with Jon in the Dragonpit, just before Tyrion returned.

Petra: I like that they brought the Dragonpit into the story and that they addressed its history and symbolic significance for the Targaryens.

Luka: It was certainly exciting for us book nerds. More importantly, aside from being a nice romantic gesture, Jon saying she’s still extraordinary without dragons is something she really needs to start believing herself if she’s going to be the ruler she aspires to be. Dragons are awesome and everything, but they’re used to rule by fear, even if you don’t intend to. The whole point of them is they are very dangerous and awesome in the traditional sense —they inspire “awe” and terror. Dany’s reference to season three, when she said “a dragon is not a slave” in Valyrian, was still quite nice, even though she should probably leave all of that behind if she wants to be a new kind of ruler. It’s a conundrum.

Petra: That dichotomy in Daenerys, which is what makes the character compelling, is really coming to a head. It was best articulated right before she burnt the Tarlys: “Join me and we’ll make the world a better place, or die.” That’s Daenerys in a nutshell. We saw that a little bit here. Like you say, she’s begining to develop a new political system that’s actually going to break the wheel and change Westeros, hopefully for the better.

Luka: But there’s no room for dragons in that new world, is there?

Petra: That’s just it! It’s interesting that even as she embraces a sort of post-feudal, proto-democratic system, she continues to embrace her Targaryen heritage. Daenerys is obviously very upset by the dragons and what happened to them. I don’t think it’s necessarily just because “that was my family, we were great, and then we fell,” I think she finds the indignity of the dragons wasting away very upsetting. In the long run, that’s really going to play against her desire to create a better world.

Luka: During her arduous reign of Meereen in A Dance with Dragons, Daenerys encapsulated this inner conflict as having to choose between being Mhysa and the Mother of Dragons. The show demonstrated this too, though through actions rather than words. Her situation in Westeros is similar but it’s not just a conflict within herself anymore; now that she’s a queen in war, it’s affecting others, for good and ill.

Luka: Before moving on from the Dragonpit, we should talk about Tyrion and Cersei. That was Peter Dinklage’s moment to shine this season, even more so than under the Red Keep with Jaime a few episodes ago. Of course, Lena Headey knocked it out of the park as well (she still deserves an Emmy!). It was such a haunting, harrowing scene. Maybe it’s because Lena Headey and Peter Dinklage are such good friends, but I really felt the connection between them, as I have in all their scenes before.

Petra: I’ve heard actors say that to be really mean to on another you have to trust each other. During that scene, I got that. It would have been very difficult to act this out with someone they didn’t know well, because they’re so bare with one another. That kind of performance can only be borne out of off-screen amicability. I’m not an actor, but it makes sense to me. If you asked me “how would Tyrion and Cersei interact were they to reunite?” that scene would be pretty much what I’d imagine: incredible anger as they get everything out on the table. There was also the nice detail of Tyrion pouring a cup of wine first for himself and then for his sister. It was just one of those beautiful wordless moments Game of Thrones is so good at. It felt reminiscent of Tywin’s small council game of chairs, back in season three. Such a lovely sequence, from beginning to end!

Luka: For a moment you believe Cersei may execute Tyrion. You could see she really wanted to. I knew she wouldn’t, but it would have been a fitting end for Tyrion, in a way, risking his life for the cause, dying at the hands of his vengeful sister.

Petra: I like that Tyrion said he hates himself for killing his father, despite everything.

Luka: Yes, but not because “he’s such a good guy.” He still believes he had valid reasons to kill him. He’d do it again, even though he didn’t say it in so many words.

Petra: It’s a genuinely complicated situation. He killed his father, who was pretty terrible, and now he hates himself as much as he hated Tywin. And, though it’s not his fault, he’s the reason Cersei doesn’t have a mother.

Luka: And, according to Cersei, the deaths of Myrcella and Tommen lay at his feet too.

Petra: I hadn’t considered that before she said it. It may not be logical, but I can see how Cersei would arrive at that conclusion. Tyrion may be a “good guy” while Cersei is framed as an antagonist, but you certainly understand why she hates her brother so much. You don’t necessarily have to follow her logic, but to her he’s the reason she’s lost the people she’s lost, and that’s as good a reason to hate someone as anyone can have.

Luka: What I didn’t expect to get out of this conversation at all was an articulation of why Tyrion supports Daenerys. I imagined such a scene would take place eventually, but I figured it would occur between Tyrion and Dany. She’s always compared to her mad father, so by contrasting her with Cersei, who could easily be considered an actual Mad Queen, Tyrion finally voiced the reason Dany deserves to be the ruler: she has bad impulses, but she wants to keep them at bay with the help of the people around her. By contrast, Cersei is quite happy to give into her own madness.

Petra: I’m so sorry that I couldn’t make it to the Burlington Bar for the finale, as you can’t see my reaction to Littlefinger’s death. I made noises I didn’t know I could make.

Luka: Rewatching the first Sansa and Littlefinger scene knowing that Sansa was playing around a bit with him, shushing out what he wants exactly, was wonderful. That said, Littlefinger played his cards well there, as carefully as he could, considering. He let her reach the conclusions he wanted her to, with little prodding.

Petra: I genuinely thought he was leading her on. I missed most of the dialogue because I was yelling at the screen. I was really angry at Sansa, and I’m so glad I’m not anymore. But it was really well done. As you said, he wasn’t being overtly manipulative: he let her think she was arriving at that conclusion by herself. Well, in fact, she was letting him think that he was letting her think she was arriving at that conclusion.

Luka: Littlefinger scenes, for some reason, always require that sort of complex wording.

Petra: I like how Arya looked over at Litlefinger at the very beginning, as she told Sansa to “get on with it.” That was a little bit of a hint. I read some criticism that Littlefinger’s death lacked the set up of other surprise deaths like Ned or Robb or Viserys or Drogo’s. I can see that, as I’m still not clear when Arya and Sansa sorted things out and brought Bran in to help. But there was also criticism that the death wasn’t thematically satisfying in the way those other iconic deaths were, and I completely disagree with that. As I keep saying, these character turns are rooted in what we already know to be true about these people. It makes complete sense for Arya and Sansa to start fighting again but for Littlefinger’s final fatal mistake to be trying to tear the Stark children apart.

Luka: As Sansa says.

Petra: Exactly. If you’re going to come up with a character like Littlefinger who’s been manipulating and toppling empires, what is the one thing that could satisfactorily cause his downfall? It would be him overplaying his hand, by trying to split the Stark sisters.

Luka: I hadn’t even considered the parallel Sansa pointed out: that Petyr did pretty much the same thing with Lysa and Catelyn (except in the case of the Tully girls he succeeded.) The only part of this storyline that bothered me was last episode, as we discussed in our previous dialogue. I still think that scene’s storytelling was a bit muddy, but I no longer believe that it affected the characters themselves negatively, and certainly not terminally. At most, it was a storytelling issue, not a plot or character issue. I love the story they wanted to tell, even if the telling of it wasn’t perfect.

Petra: Their sisterly bond started to fray and they got themselves together again.

Luka: I must say that reading people’s comments in last week’s dialogue made me appreciate Arya’s point of view, so my feelings have certainly changed in regards to her actions as well, and even more so after the finale. After watching “Beyond the Wall” for the first time, I thought the scene in Arya’s room would contaminate the entire Winterfell storyline for me, but in retrospect it turned out rather well. Except for what ended up as nothing but a niggle, it was all really nicely written and plotted out.

Luka: Baelish went through his entire bag of tricks. First he denied as much as he could, except for the parts he knew Sansa was aware of, like throwing Lady Lysa through the Moon Door. When Bran intervened it became impossible to deny any of it, so in desperation he pulled a Cersei (“power is power”) and appealed to his position as Lord Protector; and when that didn’t work (great job, Lord Royce!) he resorted to his love for Catelyn and Sansa, and pled for his life, reduced to the pitiful man he was. Aidan Gillen did some of his best work this episode, going through a much broader range than usual.

Petra: He tried everything. When he fell to his knees and begged Sansa, I thought “This is a man who is out of options.” It was such an earned character death. It was beautiful.

Luka: Are you getting as tired as I am of some people’s expectation that everything, including this death scene, should be “shocking”? We’ve been following some of these characters for seven years. The story is coming to an end. If everything, or even a lot of things, still were shocking, that would just be shitty storytelling. These moments wouldn’t be exciting and new and compelling anymore. They would be shocks for the sake of shocks. So I’m actually elated they didn’t go in that direction. They sprung a trap on Littlefinger and we may have been fooled for a while, but Littlefinger felt like a dead man walking all season, as I’ve said before, and that’s just as it should have been.

Petra: Many people predicted he would be killed with his Valyrian steel dagger, and he was. But I don’t have a problem with something being predictable as long as it’s satisfying. Because we have a fandom this “obsessive,” statistically every possible outcome has already been predicted. There’s a reddit thread out there for every possible character decision. So no, I’m not gonna be upset that R+L=J has gone according to plan, because it had to happen. I’m sure, when the show is over, some people are going to be upset that they predicted who ends up on the Iron Throne, for example. But that’s because literally every single living character has been predicted to end up on it!

Luka: Unless it’s Hot Pie or something.

Petra: I’m sure there’s a well-thought-out theory with Hot Pie on the Iron Throne.

Luka: [Laughs]

Petra: So if Hot Pie does end up ruling, there’s gonna be some person out there going “Predictable! I saw it coming!” But I don’t care, so as long as it’s earned.

Petra: For example, that I pretty much guessed Theon’s storyline this episode. I kind of picked up on the fact he wasn’t going to save Yara this season, so I assumed that his big moment would be leaving to go rescue her. I can’t say there were any real twists or shocks. That said, I absolutely loved the way he concluded this season!

Luka: Along with Headey’s scenes, the throne room discussion was an acting standout of the entire season. Especially Alfie Allen, though Harington did a great job too.

Petra: It was a great Jon moment, yes. This very messy concept of forgiveness was explored: it was apparent in the writing and the performance that Jon was still angry at Theon, but he still found a way to forgive what he could. There’s that tricky topic of “how do you move on from the bad things that you’ve done and you can’t undo?” Theon got to articulate the conflict that motivated so many of his mistakes: he always wanted to do the right thing but never had guidance. Upon hearing this, Jon relieved him of some of his turmoil by saying “You know what? You’re a Stark and a Greyjoy.”

Luka: That was heartwarming because it’s been Theon’s conflict since the beginning. Jon helped him get through it, and even encouraged him to go save Yara!

Petra: Even though Theon’s primary conflict has always been internal, as some point he needed external validation from someone else. Is he Stark, or is he a Greyjoy? Someone had to tell him that he was both. He couldn’t obtain that closure himself.

Luka: Not just someone, but someone who truly embodies Ned Stark’s character, someone who can speak on his behalf, someone who has honored his memory.

Petra: I try really hard not to hope for certain lines, because that’s setting yourself up for disappointment, but I really wanted Theon to acknowledge that Yara tried to rescue him in season 4, and that she was the only one who did.

Luka: And he said that exactly!

Petra: He did! So when I got the line that I wanted pretty much verbatim I was like…. [Incoherent, Kraken-loving excited gurgling] All right, man, this feels good!

Luka: And the predictability didn’t make it any less satisfying for you? What a concept!

Petra: It was a crucial character beat. I don’t always want character development to surprise me. I want it to be the natural progression of someone I’ve gotten to know.

Luka: You want pay-off to character development. When a story nears its end, both the characters and the story have fewer places to go. At a certain point, seven years in, if characters’ decisions are still shocking and surprising, it’s just lazy storytelling.

Petra: I’ve got some thoughts on that fight. I’m still deciding whether or not …

Luka: [Starts snickering]

Petra: … whether or not that was the stupidest thing this show’s ever done or one of the most brilliant. Let me just get this out of the way and say that, no matter what you have or don’t have down there, getting kneed in the groin four times in a row is going to hurt. I sort of like how the sound editing played up the humor of the moment. The really intense Greyjoy music cut out at the first kick and Harrag kept kneeing him in silence with this confused look on his face, like, “How?”

Luka: But perhaps for the first time the joke wasn’t played at Theon’s expense. It was at Harrag’s expense. Theon, all bloody and laughing, was in on the joke.

Petra: Theon’s smile made that moment completely worth it. And I do think that there’s something poetic about how his greatest shame turned out to be his greatest strength. There needed to be a coherent reason why Theon – slightly built and mentally unstable as he is – could beat a man four times his size in a fistfight.

Luka: I don’t usually like it when writers present physical or mental illnesses or other afflictions as a superpower – autistic or obsessive compulsive detectives, you know the trope – but in this case it actually made complete sense. I appreciate that physical pain doesn’t seem to bother Theon that much anymore. He still feels pain, of course, but he knows as few of us do that a beating isn’t the height of suffering.

Petra: I think that scene may have included my favorite shot of Theon ever.

Petra: That moment encapsulates one of the reasons why I will always find Theon more compelling to watch than Jon. Theon is allowed to look ridiculous while Jon – God love him – has to look heroic and romantic at all times. Never in a hundred-thousand seasons would the show let Jon appear as undignified as Theon does in that fight but that’s precisely what makes Theon’s victory arresting. This glorious rendition of the Greyjoy theme plays while Theon does this pain waddle to the ocean to wash himself off.

Luka: That shot of Theon washing his face is one of the most beautiful shots in the show. He’s essentially re-baptizing himself. Theon rose again harder and stronger, after all.

Petra: Believe it or not, I think I’ve actually said all I have to say about Theon. Now, it’s time: the Jon Targaryen reveal. Or rather, Aegon Targaryen!

Petra: Rhaegar had run out of Targaryen names, apparently.

Luka: See, there’s been a lot of criticism about Rhaegar naming two of his sons Aegon but I think there’s some confusion, here. Most people, myself included, initially assumed that Rhaegar was the one who named Jon and decided, inexplicably, to give two of his sons the same name. But as far as we’ve seen in the show, Lyanna was the one who named her son Aegon, and she did so only after Rhaegar had died and the other baby Aegon had been killed. In the books, we learn that Rhaegar had prophetic aspirations, which is why he named his first two children Aegon and Rhaenys. So, if Rhaegar shared his beliefs with Lyanna, then it stands to reason she would have chosen to name their first child Aegon in honor of him and of the prophetic significance of that name.

Petra: Okay, you got me. I like that interpretation.

Luka: I also want to give props to Isaac, who rarely gets any credit. That Bran performance is really difficult to pull off. It could so easily come off as dull, but it doesn’t for me, at all. When he says “Robert’s rebellion was built on a lie,” I get goosebumps.

Petra: He was emoting through monotone, which is…

Luka: Exactly! I don’t know how he does it, but he does. It can’t be an easy performance.

Petra: Can you explain to me how Bran didn’t know about the secret wedding?

Luka: He’s not omniscient, that much has been made clear. He can access anything but he’s not all-knowing at all times. He has to know what to search for. He wasn’t aware of the wedding because he didn’t know there was one to look for. Speaking of which…

Petra: I liked how sparse the reveal was. Whereas in the Tower of Joy last season, Jon’s identity was conveyed through beautiful editing and music, here Bran just stated Jon’s parentage outright, like it’s no big deal. To be honest, he sounded an awful lot like me when I’m explaining fan theories to non-Game of Thrones fans. All he had to do was start that sentence with, “Um, actually …” and it would have been uncanny.

Luka: That montage was wonderful, though. Some fans were looking forward to the sex scene and were unhappy that it was intermixed with the reveal and, vise versa, there were people who wanted the R+L=J reveal but didn’t want the incest. But I thought it was a really good idea to pair the scenes together. It made the sex scene feel like a truly fateful moment, that shot of Daenerys, seemingly the last Targaryen, looking at and Jon, seemingly a bastard, when Bran said, “He’s the heir to the Iron Throne.” Wow.

Petra: Lovely music cue, there. Lovely other things, too…

Luka: I’ll say it: that was really sexy. I find it strange that in a cast of characters mostly composed of murders and liars, incest is the transgression that crosses the line. I get the repulsion with Jaime and Cersei, not only because they’re related, but because their relationship is so toxic, and they grew up as siblings. But provided that Jon and Daenerys aren’t aware that they’re related and didn’t grow up together as family anyway, what’s the gross part, exactly? The possibility of a genetically malformed offspring, basically?

Petra: Well, sexual norms vary from culture to culture. I know some people who are married to their cousins and are happy to explain why they don’t have a problem with it. Cleopatra married her brother (and then killed him.) But sexual deviancy, however the dominant culture defines it, always disturbs people more than violence does. Also, unlike most of the murders on the show, Jon and Daenerys’ aunt/nephew consummation was framed in a romantic light. Literally, the camera angle and the lighting were lovely.

Luka: There’s a reason they put the two scenes together: it’s lit and framed beautifully but the revelation that they’re related is intended to undercut the passion of the scene.

Petra: Personally, I’m just enjoying how bizarre this storyline is: a mainstream TV show is informing its audience that two people are aunt and nephew just as they’re having sex for the first time. It references Arthurian legend as well, though whether it’s an intentional allusion I neither know nor care. King Arthur remains a very influential literary figure and, consequently, we have a lot of protagonists, particularly in fantasy, whose stories resemble Arthur’s in some way: characters who were sent away as infants and grew up under false pretenses or obtain a weapon that only they can wield …

Luka: Both of which are true of Jon.

Petra: Indeed. But what people very, very rarely bring up is the fact that Arthur had sex with his half sister and had a baby with her. So, I thoroughly appreciate that as Jon goes onto resemble King Arthur more and more, they remembered to include the incest.

Luka: Moving onto that final scene. Any thoughts?

Petra: Truthfully, I found myself feeling sort of bad for Viserion and the Night King. Seeing them both together reminded that they’re really just brainwashed villains. You know, if that poor man the Children of the Forest stabbed with dragonglass and the real Viserion could see themselves they’d both be horrified. It’s really quite sad.

Luka: It’s Leaf’s fault!

Petra: It’s Leaf’s fault. Well, it’s Man’s fault. But then it’s Leaf’s fault. Anyway, I was oddly distracted by pity while the wall was falling down. Still a cool shot, though.

Luka: If there was a single scene that could satisfactorily set up the endgame for the final season, that image of the dead breaching the Wall would be it.

Petra: Yep … I’m out of things to talk about it. I’ve got nothing.

Luka: We have nothing in more ways than one. We’re out of topics for this episode and we’re out of new Game of Thrones episodes for the next year. Maybe more.

Petra: I’m happy where it ended, though. It wasn’t like the end of season five, which just left me overly worried for the characters, with no closure. In this finale we had some beautiful character moments, some plot resolutions but also plenty of set up to look forward to. I feel like I’ve gorged myself on Game of Thrones and I’m excited for the next serving but I’m satisfied to coast until 2025 or whenever we get season eight.

Luka: We’ll be back soon looking back on this season, and later looking forward to the next one. Our dialogues aren’t done. We’re satisfied but we still have a lot to process.

Petra: I don’t smoke but the mental image that best captures how I feel is of someone smoking a cigarette in bed, sweaty but content, you know?

Luka: So what you’re saying is that Game of Thrones is like sex to you.

Petra: I … feel like that could be taken plenty of bad ways. But sure. Let’s go with that.

The post Glass Candle Dialogue Season 7, Episode 7: “The Dragon and the Wolf” appeared first on Watchers on the Wall.

Via http://watchersonthewall.com

Aidan Gillen discusses Littlefinger’s swan song in the season 7 finale

The post Aidan Gillen discusses Littlefinger’s swan song in the season 7 finale appeared first on Winter is Coming.

Via https://winteriscoming.net/2017/08/31/aidan-gillen-discusses-littlefingers-swan-song-in-the-season-7-finale/

Game of Thrones Season 7, Episode 7 “The Dragon and the Wolf” Video Recap Roundup

Welcome, welcome and welcome to the last roundup of video recaps and reviews of season 7. Targaryen incest, Real!Aegon, Zombie dragerns! And so much more. Here are what our video friends had to say about the season 7 finale of Game of Thrones.

Our old friend Ozzy Man will kick off this week’s roundup with his take on the finale.

Happy Cool

It’s Maria Bamford on this week’s Gay of Thrones!

Ser Hunts Reviews and I were on an endgame panel together at Con of Thrones and he ended up killing it with some of his predictions.

This video from Talking Thrones showed up in my sidebar and has a boatload of views. Why? Let’s discover.

What. The. Flick. was up with that episode? No Cenk, if that’s a good/bad thing for you.

History of Westeros’ show-only review! (Also this week: bonus vid of Sean dancing.)

Rawrist

Nerdist

SmokeScreen

Emergency Awesome: please tell us WTF happened in the finale

GoT Academy

Dem Thrones

Afterbuzz

Red Team Review

Thanks to all of the video people above for giving us some great content this season that breaks the show down for us with humor and analysis. There will be plenty of content leading up to season 8, to which I say bring it. Comment with predictions and which YT accounts nailed their take on the show week by week. See you next season!

The post Game of Thrones Season 7, Episode 7 “The Dragon and the Wolf” Video Recap Roundup appeared first on Watchers on the Wall.

Via http://watchersonthewall.com

Baltimore Oyster Luggers (1905)

Shorpy.com: Baltimore circa 1905. “Oyster luggers at the docks.” Panorama made from two 8×10 inch glass negatives. Detroit Photographic Company. View full size.

from Baltimore Or Less http://www.baltimoreorless.com/2017/08/baltimore-oyster-luggers-1905/

Director Jeremy Podeswa explains Tyrion’s worried look in “The Dragon and the Wolf”

The post Director Jeremy Podeswa explains Tyrion’s worried look in “The Dragon and the Wolf” appeared first on Winter is Coming.

Via https://winteriscoming.net/2017/08/30/director-jeremy-podeswa-reveals-tyrion-thinking-boat/