#hotd speculation

[sylasthegrim]

About Helaena... It looks to me that she's giving birth. I have one or two fears about that. I'm afraid they will either have her die in childbirth or have the baby die and Helaena kill herself in grief. Seems like something the showrunners would do.

[purpleserpents]

the alicent turncloak arc is so perfectly set up it’s insane. rhaenyra gaining a huge advantage by conjuring so many dragons in a short time span, causing aemond to freak out and push helaena and daeron to ride to war with their dragons. alicent, seeing her two purest children at risk of dying in battle, flees to dragonstone with helaena and jaehaera on dreamfyre

[somerhall]

So the new Season 3 still of Alys Rivers has her looking very different to how she did in Season 2. She’s way more richly dressed and her styling is reminiscent of Alicent’s. I’m fascinated by this change and it’s made me have some thoughts.

I love the idea of Alys Rivers being the ghost in Harrenhal /or some sort of personification of Harrenhal or of the Riverlands/ or a personification of the old gods tied to the weirwood trees. She’s a spiritual entity and not truly corporeal, so your mind decides how you want to see her. Harrenhal haunts you so Alys knows all your deepest, darkest thoughts, desires, sins and insecurities. And the gods would be able to see your heart, wouldn’t they?

With this in mind, here’s my analysis of some of Daemon’s interactions with Alys and some thoughts on what it might suggest for Aemond’s future encounters with Alys. (This includes some Season 3 spoilers and leaks.)

Daemon sees Alys as a servant because he’s a Targaryen/Valyrian supremacist (he’s a Daemon supremacist, lbr) who thinks everyone who’s not Targaryen/Valyrian is beneath him. (It’s also pretty interesting how in the scene where Daemon sees Alys for the first time, she walks in as Ser Simon is making an oath and swearing by the gods....) The new Alys still suggests Aemond will view her as a noble bastard like the ‘Strong boys’ and as the Jocasta to his Oedipus because he’s ruled by the injustices of his childhood (meaning him being bullied by Aegon and Rhaenyra’s sons before he got a dragon) and by his Mommy issues with Alicent.

(Also, going with the Oedipal theme, there’s a leak that says Aemond will have a dream of himself beheading Otto Hightower in front of the iron throne. Otto was more of a father figure to Aegon and Aemond than Viserys was and Oedipus did kill his own father, so there's that.)

Is Aemond going to have that dream and then go and behead Ser Simon, similar to how Daemon sometimes saw Ser Simon after he'd had a dream about Viserys and took his frustrations with the dream out on Ser Simon? Daemon accused Ser Simon of plotting against him and threatened him with a knife right after he'd had a dream of himself being confronted by Viserys in the throne room. Ultimately Daemon didn't do harm to Ser Simon, but Aemond might not be so merciful, especially if he's just heard about Rhaenyra taking King's Landing.

^This scene. It’s the first time Daemon hears Alys’s voice. Was Alys actually standing behind him telling him, ‘You’ll die in this place.’ Or did he just hear a whisper on the breeze the same way Alfred Broome does when he’s standing near the weirwood tree and hears a whisper of, ‘Traitor.’ Is Aemond going to have some sort of experience near the tree before he starts having conversations with Alys?

Many (all?) of the conversations Daemon has with Alys could just as well be his internal monologues. E.g. ^This scene where Daemon talks with Alys about Rhaenyra and tells her he’s more suited to rule than Rhaenyra is. Maybe he was just brooding and thinking all that to himself. Does Ser Simon keep coming across Daemon muttering alarmingly treasonous things to himself and thinks, ‘Good gods, this man needs an intervention.’ (And how does Ser Simon see Alys, I wonder?)

Alys knows Daemon desperately wants old Lord Grover Tully dead because that would finally enable him to get the Riverlands on his side. And what do you know, when Daemon is at his lowest and ready to give up and leave Harrenhal, Alys gives him hope by telling him the wind will change in three days, i.e. Lord Tully will be dead in three days. You could also interpret this as her offering to kill Lord Tully for him, an idea Daemon himself came up with first when he suggested Oscar Tully ‘mercy kill’ his grandfather. Aemond knows his entire family is against him, he wants to be king, and he likely wants to start his own line - both so that he can finally have the family that’s loyal to him and because a king needs an heir to secure his rule. (In the first Season 3 teaser Aemond says, ‘A new dawn is coming, a new line of unsullied kings.’) So will there be a similar 'wish fulfillment' scene where Alys suggests Aemond’s desire to have a wife and son will come true, possibly because she herself will make it come true??

Of course it's possible Alys is not a fully supernatural entity; she's just a witch who can tell the future, reads people very well and ultimately has her own agenda. But some of her insights into Daemon's private thoughts/dreams were pretty uncanny, and I like the suggestion that there's something much stranger and way more profound going on with her - even if it's not true and/or will never be confirmed, it's fun to speculate on!

[greenqueenhightower]

Is that... HELAENA passing outside of the small council?!

This is the conversation that precedes her appearance:

I see what you did there, HBO.

[beware-of-pity]

I need people who would die on the hill of "Fire and Blood is completely unreliable, therefore we cannot trust anything that's written in it" to open their eyes and read a book that is similar to the structure that Fire and Blood uses to realize how wrong of a statement that is. I know that this will probably be received as a very hot take but I do not believe that everything needs to be analyzed or has to have a deeper meaning behind it. The curtain can be blue and there doesn't have to be a reason for the curtain to be blue other than the fact that it's just blue (hope someone gets the reference). Ryan Condall obviously disagrees with that, because in his quest to recreate his own 'magnum opus' of a 'Shakespearian tragedy', as he always likes to refer to it as, he has instead created the equivalent of a dumpster on fire next to the other bigger dumpster on fire that was Game of thrones.

Bland, whitewashed characters with little to no turmoil or agency going on are revered as complex and nuantical on Twitter. And if you even dare to disagree, you're immediately sentenced to the stake. Characters like Alicent and Rhaenyra could literally not even be in the episode and nothing would change. Rhaenyra was in episode 4 for not even 5 minutes and with everything going on in it you wouldn't even have noticed that. She should have been there, leading the council as Cole marched on rook's rest, her only available connection to the mainland in the crownlands, apart from Claw Isle, after duskendale fell to the greens and instead her only scene in such climactic episode is her walk of shame returning home and her, rightfully, getting scolded by her son for thinking that she could still sue for peace with Alicent, the mother of her son's murderer. The show makes the decision to have Rhaenys volunteer instead of having Rhaenyra send her there so that later when Rhaenys dies Rhaenyra cannot be blamed for it. The fundamental changes of characters like Alicent don't work because the writers are not able to sustain such changes from the source material they are deriving the story from. Going from leading the council that would place Aegon on the throne, to never even being in on the plan to usurp Rhaenyra, that her father created, is such a letdown for such a political savy character like book Alicent.

Aging her down, to Rhaenyra's age, and making these two childhood best friends, was a mistake.

What is very evident is that the showrunners have no clue, so far, what to do with a character like show Alicent. If she's not going to lead the council when Aegon is bedridden and Aemond is off to fight in the Riverlands, why doesn't she just leave?

Going from an active participant in a usurpation from somebody who needs to miss-hear or misunderstand her dying husband for her to get in on the plan, only so there is an excuse to get her on the war council is bad writing.

Making people believe that Rhaenyra was usurped because of a misunderstanding, and not only because she was a woman, is bad writing. And going to the extremes, of having these two 'betray' each other in order to have a reason to make Rhaenyra look bad in the eyes of her rivals is bad writing. Rhaenyra could have been the perfect heir, and even only because she was a woman, Otto and Alicent would have usurped her either way.

Going back to the point of this post; Timelines, ages, events, who got married to who, how many kids they had, things that you can quantify are not something that can be made up, used as rumors or form of propaganda in a history book. What you make up as a rumor is sexual escapades and a young girl seducing her sworn shield who has watched over her since she was seven. Things that can make a person look bad to glorify or uphold the good of someone else alongside all the other stuff that happens behind closed doors and makes you question where the information is coming from.

I find it so odd that the aggressive marketing team for the second season was all about choosing your side. Lol, what is there to even choose? Choose between the overly sanctified Rhaenyra, who god forbid is still searching for the peace that has already been thrown over the cliff long ago, and is not allowed yet to make a mistake. Or, Alicent, the pathetic hypocrite who made her bed and is not willing to admit it. Anything interesting about these two women is completely being cut so that Ryan Condall and Co. can continue to spread the "men are bad and violent, women are the gentle peacemakers that don't want war." which is leaning a little too heavy for my taste into gender essentialism which would make every choice they have ever made about these two characters more misogynistic than any of the action of the actual misogynistic characters in this story. Taking away the very little agency these characters had and constantly making them the perpetual victims of the patriarchy and completely sidelining any sort of character traits that they may actually develop through their actions had they actually been taking any, doesn't work for me.

This show was a mistake.

[dyannasdayne]

Shot in the dark, but I feel like Alicent's "I told you it would come to this," might be directed at Rhaenyra? If the leaks about Alicent being an advisor to Rhaenyra are true, I can see that being close to the end of the season where they find out about the Betrayers and Daeron wrecking shit. Rhaenyra is starting to lose and they all know it. Gwayne ripping someone apart in the trailer was definitely quite telling too and really makes me believe he's taking over the Hightower faction once Ormund dies in Tumbleton.

[maybeiwasjustjade]

“Maelor’s just a baby. He’s unimportant and can be replaced by anyone!”

You’re right: Maelor as himself is unimportant; GRRM already stated that. But what y’all weird Condal defenders and extreme Rhaenyra stans seem to be missing is that: Maelor isn’t an important character, but he is an insanely important plot device. Just as both Luke and Jaehaerys were both needed to kickstart the Dance.

Unlike Joffrey or Rhaena or Baela, Jaehaera and Maelor are not interchangeable. Rhaena and Baela were so irrelevant in the Dance that merging Rhaena and Nettles was actually possible to bolster Rhaena’s character. If Baela and Rhaena were to switch places in terms of plot relevance it also changes nothing. Joffrey didn’t even do anything until he died, and it still didn’t do squat. Whether he dies at the Gullet in s3 or in KL, it matters not.

But Maelor and Jaehaera? If Maelor doesn’t exist, Bitterbridge doesn’t happen. Daeron’s whole arc in the beginning revolves around the horrific murder of his baby nephew. Hugh and Ulf switch teams at First Tumbleton, which allows for Second Tumbleton to happen and the subsequent deaths of Seasmoke, Vermithor, and Tessarion.

And if Maelor never existed and his head never delivered to Rhaenyra, then the last shred of Helaena’s sanity won’t snap. Beloved Queen Helaena, who was driven to near insanity by the butchering of both her sons, whose daughter and husband were hidden far away from her. Sweet Queen Helaena who jumped from a tower and died, and whose spilled blood ignited a riot that destroyed the Targaryen’s divine symbols.

Jaehaera cannot take Maelor’s place because she has a more important role to play. She needs to be alive by the end of the Dance to unify the factions in marriage.

If Jaehaera were to die at Bitterbridge, the ending is useless. She is his only heir, and 2x08 states that he’s incapable of siring more. The whole point of the Dance was for it to end with the union of Jaehaera and Aegon III, and while Jaehaera wouldn’t live long enough to be the progenitor of the Blackfyres, she is still the key to ending the Dance. Same way Condal will need to be very careful and smart in how he arranges the Gullet to ensure Aegon lives. Viserys is sadly a ??? situation, because Condal could very well decide he doesn’t care that the GoT Targs came from Viserys’ line and not Aegon’s.

If Bitterbridge is to happen, it needs to be one of Aegon’s kids, not Rhaenyra’s. And Aegon only has one child now.

They could skip Bitterbridge entirely, I suppose. But then what causes First Tumbleton and the Two Betrayers?

I can even guess that Maelor was originally removed not because of the many dumb reasons I’m sure Condal spewed to GRRM, but for the sole reason of it casting a massive blight over Rhaenyra. Saint Rhaenyra, the Realm’s Delight, ordered a bounty placed on the head of her three year old nephew, leading to his body being torn apart so badly the only part that survived to be sent was his head. Condal and Hess would never be brave enough to do that to their precious queen. So Maelor had to go.

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

HotD seems a bit kinder to Ser Otto and Queen Alicent and now even Ser Gwayne. Granted the Hightowers we meet in the main story are only just briefly mentioned by other characters, but what do hear of them like Leyton or Lynesse aren't that great. The Lannister get a lot of (not undeserved) flack from within the fandom, but are under-the-radar terrible as Houses like the Lannisters or even the Freys or Boltons?

I wouldn't say HOTD is kinder to the Hightowers, as much as it allows them to be real people and not just historical caricatures or empty shells. (The biggest failure of F&B's history book conceit, more than any of the other problems with that book.)

For example, Gwayne in the book gets assigned to the Gold Cloaks to keep an eye on them in case some are still loyal to Daemon, and then during the Fall of King's Landing gets murked by his own men because indeed they are still loyal to Daemon. That's it, that's all there is to him, there's no there there. (Although the "You turncloaks!" "Daemon gave us these cloaks and they're gold no matter how you turn them." is a great line, and I hope it's kept even if Gwayne may not be involved.)

Gwayne in the show, however, is a prissy classist racist aristocrat, who is still brave in battle and protective of his sister and caring for his nephew; he's a knight who helps depict GRRM's knighthood themes with Criston; he's an actual person, both good and bad as a GRRM character should be. I have hopes that Gwayne takes the Ser Hobert Hightower role for the Caltrops and Second Tumbleton, that would be a great ending (especially considering his relationship with Daeron) for an excellent actor.

Re the main story Hightowers -- well, generally GRRM goes by Tolstoy's principle of "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Or as he put it, "happy families are boring." Not everyone always gets along in real families, and even the most beloved king and queen can be real assholes to their daughters. I imagine that when we actually meet Leyton in TWOW and find out exactly how complicated his family is -- four wives and ten children, you know there's friction there -- we'll see something imperfect, but different from the Lannisters, Freys, or Boltons. Maybe more dysfunctional the way Cregan Stark's family was dysfunctional or the Tyrells are dysfunctional. (If you think they're a perfectly happy family, then you entirely missed Olenna's relationship with Mace, Mace's relationship with Willas and Loras, Mace's relationship with Margaery, Olenna's relationship with Alerie, and so on and so forth.)

I can see Leyton as a patriarch who became increasingly distant as he got more into esoteric research (he hasn't come down from the top of the Hightower in more than a decade), leaving the eldest son Baelor to manage everything practical in the absence of his father. Was Leyton already half-distant the year before he stopped leaving the Hightower, and that's why he let his youngest daughter (only 16 or 17 years old) marry a newly knighted 35-year-old poor-ass lord from the back of beyond just because he did well in a tourney? How did the rest of the family react to that? The people of Oldtown don't think much of Lynesse now, but how did they feel when their young golden lady was taken away by a bear? These kinds of complicated relationships are the sort of detail GRRM loves to sink his teeth into, and is one of the reasons I'm so looking forward to Sam's Oldtown chapters almost more than anything in TWOW.