@oddric reblogged your post voldemortymort: I’m not deep into the asoiaf lore... and added:
I always took ‘all men must die’ to be thematically matched to the nature of the Others. The Kindly Man says ‘Do you know of any folk who live forever’ and no, Arya doesn’t, but we as the audience know that there are. We have the Others, Coldhands, Beric, Lady Stoneheart, Robert Strong, on and on and on, we have men should have died but didn’t.
I mean... sort of, but really no? The Others can be killed, via dragonglass and dragonsteel. Beric, a fire wight, died permanently so that Lady Stoneheart could live (as a fire wight). Coldhands is dead, his blood doesn’t flow, he’s an ice wight who just is not under the control of the Others. Ser Robert Strong is also a living dead man who you know will be destroyed soon enough.
And you didn’t list them, but I’ll assume they’re included in your “on and on and on”... Bloodraven, while unnaturally preserved, has mostly gone into the tree, he’s not long for this world. The other CotF greenseers are in stasis, that’s not true life, and they too are mostly tree-life now. CotF themselves are not immortal, just long-lived compared to humans, and they can be killed. The supposedly immortal Undying? are now dead.
None of these people are truly immortal, they’re still under the domain of death. Nobody lives forever. Valar morghulis. Even the Others.
(also if you are interested in how the Faceless Men and their Many-Faced God religion may view the Others and their wights, please see this post and its links.)
It’s always bothered me that Gandalf comes back from the dead. The Red Wedding for me in Lord of the Rings is the mines of Moria, and when Gandalf falls — it’s a devastating moment! [...] And then in the next book, he shows up again, and [...] ehh, he’s more or less the same as always, except he’s more powerful. It always felt a little bit like a cheat to me. And as I got older and considered it more, it also seemed to me that death doesn’t make you more powerful. That’s, in some ways, me talking to Tolkien in the dialogue, saying, “Yeah, if someone comes back from being dead, especially if they suffer a violent, traumatic death, they’re not going to come back as nice as ever." That’s what I was trying to do, and am still trying to do, with the Lady Stoneheart character. [...]
And poor Beric Dondarrion, who was set up as the foreshadowing of all this, every time he’s a little less Beric. His memories are fading, he’s got all these scars, he’s becoming more and more physically hideous, because he’s not a living human being anymore. His heart isn’t beating, his blood isn’t flowing in his veins, he’s a wight, but a wight animated by fire instead of by ice, now we’re getting back to the whole fire and ice thing.
--GRRM, when asked about Jon Snow being “drained by the experience of coming back from the dead”
I feel like this is relevant to what I was saying about Jon and the WftD, before this interview came out:
“In the cold night air the wound was smoking. […] He never felt the fourth knife. Only the cold …”
and this juxtaposition of cold and heat here is fascinating to me, you have the cold of the night’s watch, their resistance to Jon’s causes, and then you have Jon’s smoking, fiery passion to save everyone literally bleeding out of him as he dies
P l e a s e click the above link, I don’t wanna explain all those ice vs fire thoughts again, but anyways, to me, the War for the Dawn seems like the ice cold of the Others trying to destroy the fiery passion of humanity, and to chain and enslave humanity and turn everyone into their ice slaves to do their bidding, with no will of their own.
When the Watch stabs Jon Snow, they do the Others’ work for them, doing the work of ice, turning Jon cold and dead, and Melisandre is gonna have to bring Jon back in TWOW, lend him some fire to be able to do the work that he left unfinished.
And if Jon’s a “wight animated by fire” to me it feels like Jon is being brought back for this one specific purpose - to fight in the War for the Dawn - so once that’s over, does he ... idk what words I’m looking for here ... expire? release his hold on life? Whatever it is Jon’s gonna do, I keep saying, I don’t believe Jon’s gonna be around after the War for the Dawn, and I really don’t think Dany or Tyrion are gonna survive it either.
and this is reallyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy really speculative now, ok, im just spitballing in the absence of any new book material, but I’ve wondered for a while if Benjen is being held hostage by the Others, like “Aliens hold the initial human hostage in stasis to study him or use him as bait or w/e” kind of thing in a scifi. Like, the Others need an example of humanity’s “fire” for mass destruction or s/t idk.
And so what I’m wondering now is, if the Others have this sort of ... “token” fire to use against humanity
what if
one of the prophecy’s rhaegar read predicted that, predicted benjen being captured (not by name or w/e, just something)
and Rhaegar was trying to counter this prophecy, by building his Team Humanity of three fire babies
(oh, heyyyyy, Elia’s sigil was a sun, that’s pretty fucking cool, Rhaegar must have been pretty happy with that while he was making his first two babies)
so anyways
Rhaegar was trying to counter whatever the prophecy said the others were trying to do, with some sort of, for lack of a better phrase, “token” ice teammate, so he becomes quite enchanted by the idea of Lyanna, to create his third fire baby with a touch of “ice”
except as we all know, you can’t force prophecy, prophecy has a mind of its own, and maybe the prophecy was really about how jon would die by cold/ice and be resurrected in fire
idk, these are only half formed thoughts, I’m just spitballing here, please do not take this as gospel truth, you do not need to respond with a 5000 word essay on why i am wrong, this is just 10 minutes of a free thinking exercise, chill
i think this idea of “fire wights” is important tho
(and yes, if GRRM can write a story about a giant spider falling in love, then fuck yes I think GRRM can write a story about a fire wight falling in love with a doomed living girl, asoiaf is all about love, my god. i wish i had a gif of bart simpson on a skateboard wearing a jon/dany tshirt . “cliche” 👀 godddddd, have i told you all how much i love grrm’s doomed love stories, my godddddddd, i loved them in dreamsongs, i loved them, i am soooooooooo ready for twow, i am sooooooo ready for jon/dany in the books. so ready.)
((the idea of “fire wight falling in love with living girl” makes me love J/D even more, it’s doomed, doooooomed, doomed like The Lonely Songs of Laren Dorr, I still haven’t recovered from that. SO READY FOR TWOW. SO READY.)
HI Bfly from Brasil, loved your blog, Do you think that Jon Snow will win some magic prophertys after the ressurection? Do you think that he will have sex, with who? Do you think he can bear children? And are Jon and Catelyn/stoneheart fates going to clash? What are your thoughts about ressurection in general in the ASOIAF universe, kisses you do a amazing job.
Thanks so much! So, to go down your list of questions–
Will Jon have magic properties after his resurrection: Yes, I think he’ll be able to light his sword on fire with his blood like Beric Dondarrion did, making it the true sword Lightbringer. (As opposed to the metaphorical Lightbringer, which is Dany’s dragons.) I think his warg abilities will also become much stronger and more consciously accessible to him after his time in Ghost’s mind.
Will Jon have sex: Yes. Possibly with Val and/or Melisandre; and then later with Dany for certain.
Does Jon have the ability to conceive children: I really don’t know. Using Beric as our standard for a fire wight resurrected soon after death, they can breathe and bleed, so other bodily functions should also keep going. Lady Stoneheart is more complicated, as Catelyn was three days dead, her flesh rotting in a river, before she was resurrected; if Jon doesn’t get resurrected right away, his body will still likely be preserved in one of the Wall’s ice cells, which should keep him more intact, so to speak. And some see foreshadowing that Jon and Dany will have a child. Nevertheless, this is still a wait-and-see for me.
Will the fates of Jon and Lady Stoneheart clash: I thoroughly doubt it. Stoneheart will end in the Riverlands, likely soon after she finishes her vengeance on House Frey and House Lannister, and I really don’t think Jon will ever go south, at least not while she’s still active. However, Arya’s traumatic experience with the revenant that her mother became (not to mention her experience with Beric) may add an edge of worry and fear to her otherwise joyous reunion with Jon, so they’ll have a connection in that sense at least.
My thoughts about resurrection in general in ASOIAF go back to the things GRRM’s said. Things like the Beric we see in ASOS isn’t the same as the handsome young knight who was sent on the mission to the Riverlands in AGOT. That he couldn’t ever write a Stoneheart POV, because Catelyn’s dead. That in LOTR, Gandalf should have stayed dead, or come back far more changed, broken and scary, not purer and friendlier. That “death does change a person”. I think that Jon will come back different. Because he’s a warg, because he’ll have a second life inside Ghost, it’s possible that his mind/soul/personality will be preserved better than other resurrections have been, but nevertheless, he’s not going to be the same man as the Jon we’ve known so far.
Since you’re interested in this topic, you can see many more of my posts on the subject under this tag. Hope that helps!
Meta / theory / speculation about ice and fire wights, in chat format
@lintsukka asked: Hey, have you seen this: http://time.com/4791258/game-of-thrones-george-r-r-martin-interview/
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: yep. Nice to have confirmation of theories. :)
lintsukka: okay, thanks. I just got really excited when I read it because, sweet, theories getting confirmed.
lintsukka: Seems like it. Maybe he will confirm the whole “beyond the curtain of light thing” too?
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: ahahah I wish, but that’s endgame stuff, he’s probably going to hold onto that as long as he can. Though after the GoT resurrection of Jon, he became far less cagey about saying whether Jon was alive or not? so who knows.
lintsukka: Has he confirmed that Jon is alive (or first dead and then reanimated) in the books, or is that just that everyone says it is? I’m pretty new to the fandom, so a lot of things are kind of weird.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: For quite a while he refused to say one way or another. Just interviews where he was like “oh you think he’s dead, do you?”
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: But for certain, before GoT brought him back, GRRM never said how Jon could possibly survive the assassination. Specifically linking him up with Beric and Stoneheart is a brand-new reveal. Although, of course, something people have theorized for years.
lintsukka: Do you have any theories on how would Jon be different when he comes back? Because I was deep diving into your blog couple days ago, and couldn’t find anything.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: I probably have said something… I think I might even have a tag for Jon’s resurrection, made after I realized I’d written like a dozen posts on the subject.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: aha yes. http://nobodysuspectsthebutterfly.tumblr.com/tagged/Jon’s_resurrection
lintsukka: awww thanks. Also I’ve seen a couple people mentioning a possible fire wights army for mankind, based on that interview. any thoughts on that?
lintsukka: Personally I think it sounds weird, if the fight is between the living and the dead, but anything is possible I guess.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: mmmnnn… I don’t think that’s a good idea. Like, look at what GRRM says about Beric and Catelyn, how they’ve changed, how they’ve come back *wrong*, in not so many words.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: An army of dead people like that would be terrible to comprehend. Not to mention it’s unfeasible to arrange. You need a gifted priest of R'hllor, performing the last kiss ceremony.
lintsukka: Yeah exactly, but I’m sure there will be new crack theories about it.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: It’s not like – wave a hand, they’re up and about again, you need to fill your mouth with fire and somehow be powered up by the god and breathe the fire of life into a dead body. And who knows how much it takes out of the priest, like Thoros is a shell of himself too.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: And Beric isn’t alive anymore, he passed his flame onto Catelyn’s dead body. So it’s not like firewights can make more firewights either, like a candle can light many candles. It’s just one at a time.
lintsukka: Do you think icewights are reanimated the same way?
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: I think the ice wights are reanimated through the cold winds of the Others.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: I’d have to find the exact textual reference (I think there’s something in Varamyr’s prologue, and Tormund talks about it too), but there I think they *do* wave their hand or something. A cold wind blows, filled with their ice magic, and the dead rise.
lintsukka: So firewights are bit more “human” than icewights (not much but then again there is Coldhands), but where icewights lack in quality they make up in quantity?
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: yep. There’s evidently some persona left – like in AGOT, the Night’s Watch ice zombies knew where Jeor Mormont’s rooms were, knew to attack him specifically. And in ASOS the Small Paul wight went after Sam. But they’re totally under the control of the Others.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: I think Coldhands was somehow freed from that control, which is why he can talk and has a personality. I don’t know if it’s possible to free all the wights, or if what happened to him was unique.
lintsukka: So like in firewights, the amount of time they stay dead affects how will they be when they come back to life?
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: I think so. Also the repetition. Cateyn was dead for 3 days, in water, which is why Stoneheart is so physically deteriorated. (Not to mention her injuries right before her death.) She’s got mold growing on her, her skin is coming off, etc. Beric was brought back six times, losing more and more of his memories, his self, each time. (In addition to the physical deterioration from the things that killed him.)
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: GRRM’s said that Beric that we see in ASOS is not at all like the proud young lordling of the Hand’s Tourney, the man who Ned sent on the mission to stop the Lannister incursion in the Riverlands and protect the smallfolk. He’s become something else, his mission is all that’s left. Same with Stoneheart, she's not Catelyn anymore.
lintsukka: Do you think icewights can be “saved” like Coldhands, or will they just be burned to the ground without any other option?
lintsukka: Lady Stoneheart is on a killing spree to destroy those who she thinks are responsible for the Red Wedding, so are icewights on a similar killing spree against the living because they think similar to her, or are they just blindly following the leader of the others? Basically do you think icewights have any motivation similar to firewights, or is the Great Other just fully controlling them?
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: I don’t know if the ice wights can be saved. It may be if the source of the Others’ power is destroyed (blowing up whatever’s beyond the curtain of light with dragonfire, say), that the wights will just drop to the ground, dead again. (Kind of like the end of the Phantom Menace, that robot army.) But I’m sure that the ice wights are under the complete control of the Others, yes.
lintsukka: Can George’s bitter ending be that icewights, like firewights, still have some humanity left in them, but those suffering humans have to be destroyed so the living can survive? Or at least part of the bitter ending, anyway.
nobodysuspectsthebutterfly: Could be. We’ll just have to see.
