#shippinions

[forsaken-confessional]

007n7 and guest1337 should kiss

this is truly a fire first ask -mod 🥨

[onionjulius]

Do you ship Catelyn with someone besides Ned?

Hi! 

Hrmm, well certainly not in the same way or to the same extent. I’m unfortunately very canon-oriented, for whatever reason I don’t tend to smush two people together romantically/sexually/etc until I see it happen. I mean, I don’t get that “NNNNNNNG NOW KISS” feeling, it’s usually much milder if it’s not somewhat canonical. And I think that Ned/Cat is deeper than a lot of people really realize or, like ... embrace in fandom. Part of what I’m attached to is what I feel GRRM is “saying” with them or whatever.

I’m interested in her other relationships suggested by canon, like with Brandon and Petyr. But in those cases it depends on what “shipping” means. I don’t want her together 4vr with Brandon but he was part of her life so I’m interested in that dynamic and I could see myself having fun with them in, for example, a modern AU. He represents that aspect of western masculinity that hides from women, he’s (possibly) one person in front of her and another person behind her back, and while that doesn’t make me gladdened by the idea of her ending up with him for good, I do think it brings out interesting themes. Like, everyone kinda lies to Catelyn, even her beloved dad. Nobody’s true, a good man is just so hard to find, etc. It’s interesting thematically in terms of gendered western tropes, to me.

Likewise Petyr was a part of her life and I think he too brings out interesting themes or whatnot. Of course he puts her on a pedestal but OTOH, from Cat’s POV, what other man could ever say “Only Cat”? I think that’s interesting and ... I think that’s not lost on her. Also, of course, he too is a liar.

I love her dynamic with Brienne, which I tend to see as friendship, but I support the ship even if I don’t ... IDK, I don’t think I quite ship it because she’s only 19 and though age differences aren’t deal breakers to me, she compares Brienne to her daughter Sansa and that makes me think she sees Brienne closer to a child? But nevertheless I support the ship, I guess I’m an ally of the ship, heheh.

And then I have various crackships because crack is fun and life should be fun. Cat/Theon, Cat/Cersei, Cat/Tywin, Cat/Roose ... I think Cat and Jason Mallister would have been a sophisticated af milf/dilf pairing in some au Widow Catelyn Remarries au. Also Cat and Yohn Royce. I wish I could femslash her with more people but as you know, GRRM doesn’t give her many (non-related) women companions. Maybe someone should sell me on Cat/Maege.

[onionjulius]

@fluffycakesistainted replied to your post “Do you ship Catelyn with someone besides Ned?”

i pretty much only ship based on canon, too.

@rainhalydia replied to your post “Do you ship Catelyn with someone besides Ned?”

I feel you on the needing canon to get interested in ships thing... I also could see Cat and Jason having something nice if things worked out differently, mostly because he's so courteous to her and she thinks to herself that he's handsome, but that's basically it.

I like to put together non-canon ships in my head too, but I’m never as crazy about them as when I’m purely in “input mode”. Unfortunately being that way skews heavily het, unless you have like an Eve/Villanelle dynamic (I usually ship things with at least one woman, also ... I’v’e noticed ... hopefully I’ll branch out).

[onionjulius]

Ned/Cat Anon: I’m sorry for bothering you again and I swear this will be the last message. Why would the suggestion of someone else matter to them? I understand Ned has an inferiority complex with Brandon and Cat has unresolved issues/fears about the other woman. But did they doubt the other one’s feelings? Was Cat worried that if Ned was given the choice, he wouldn’t have chosen her and she wanted to be his choice? Thank you for entertaining all my questions. Your answers have been wonderful.

No it’s no bother, it’s actually really really nice to get asks :D

I think the idea, which it seems you’re getting at, is that there are degrees of love, and someone may love you, but they love someone else more, or in a more pure way. Like, Arya may wonder if her mom loves her other kids more, even though she still loves Arya. Edmure feels like his dad loves him but only because he has to, which seems to diminish it somehow. With that quote I posted from Jorah, it seems really clear that he loved Lynesse in a way that just feels superior to the way he loved his first Glover wife. We have a few men in this series whose wives die and they never remarry, and it lends a certain aura to that dead wife’s place in that man’s heart, the idea being that once you experience some supreme kind of love you can’t really accept a substitute for it. It seems to me like GRRM shows us different kinds of love, and sometimes he suggests a hierarchy, but sometimes he also leaves room for questioning such a thing. Because we see examples of idealized love go really badly, like with LF, Robert, etc.

I don’t think Cat ever articulated something like “If she was alive today and he had both of us in front of him to choose from, he’d choose her” because she’s too pragmatic for hypotheticals. But I think this shows that even someone so practical can have discontent about something like this. In the early years it might have been easier to understand lingering feelings, but after all that time and with all their kids and a good rapport and lots of bonding, and a lot of sincere commitment on her part to understand and love every thing about him, including parts that exclude her, it probably just gets to her that this ghost of Jon’s mom makes Ned act so unlike himself in just about any other context. And here’s also where I don’t think you can divorce it from their specific setting: I think it also felt like the kids she provided “for him” never measured up after Jon, because Jon could, for all she knows, be the son of the woman he’d choose to be with if he could have chosen. And when it regards a mother’s kids, I can see that being really hurtful, no matter how pragmatic one is. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the movie version of the The Lion in Winter (Peter O’Toole, Katharine Hepburn), but there is a scene where King Henry and his wife Eleanor are fighting and she’s really sticking it to him, and then he says that he wants a new wife to give him new sons. When he says that, it’s like she goes into a different register, like he’s hit a new low. She says “Your sons are part of you, we made them, they’re our boys.” They have an extremely contentious relationship, but that thing hurts like no other. I don’t reduce Cat only to being a mom, but still, providing your husband heirs is a biiig thing in this society, you do have to clear that hurdle, so it gets really ingrained as an organic part of these women’s identities.

I never can articulate this subject as well as I want, which is so annoying, lol. I feel like I’ve just said more words but not really really clarified anything. I guess what I’m trying to say is that these things aren’t purely rational but Martin kind of treats it as very human to feel these things. I think they loved each other and knew that the other one loved them, but it still causes pain that it may be some lesser kind of love, even though rationally speaking, it’s a good life. I don’t think Cat would ever really say even to herself that she would want to be Ned’s choice in a vacuum, but she would hope that their years together would count for something, and it’s after 5, 10, 15 years together and still no clarity on the Jon situation that the pain compounds. 

I also want to point out that, like, Cat thinks it may be true that Jon is Ned’s true love’s son, but it’s only one possibility, right? So naturally there are also times when she’d probably tell herself to ignore it completely because (A) it doesn’t actually change the current reality (B) if it isn’t true then why bother being sad over it? But the doubt keeps reinserting itself intermittently. I say that because I don’t want it to seem like I think she was constantly sad. There are a lot of ups and downs in a relationship and there’s room for a lot of happy feelings as well. 

Like, say you’re going out with someone, and they’ve dated before and let’s say you know they were even in love before and had proposed and everything but it didn’t work out. So now they’re with you and it’s going great, except their best friend keeps coming over and saying “Let me tell you, he really really loved that ex girlfriend. Like, so much. Like, whoa, you would not believe. So much. Very lots.” Wouldn’t that get to you? Even though you knew that they were in love before, they told you themselves, and you have no expectation of being their One True Love? Like, it’s the repeating suggestion that gets into your head. Maybe rationally you could say that it shouldn’t bother you because it’s not telling you anything that you yourself didn’t claim to be okay with. But it’s still kinda … irritating …

[onionjulius]

Ned/Cat Anon: I suppose I mean love vs. “in love” as whether you think their love was more family based or lovers-how genuine, strong, or deep. Idk if I necessarily believe their lack of choice/duty-driven aspects negates the validity of their love; however, I do wonder if their duty foundation prevented them from fully accepting its depth. However, your answer has me wondering by what you mean about the “pining” and “possessiveness” of their relationship.

I think they were in love, then. I think that having children did a lot for letting them bond, but I think they see each other as more than just friendly co-parents. I think Cat comforted Ned after he came back from the war with almost all of his family dead. I think Ned wanted to make her happy in her strange new home. I think they were very earnest about being good spouses in the truest sense. I think their relationship is special to each of them in that while other people can also be friends and family, only they are each other’s mate. This is a very patriarchal way to put it, but he’s her man and she’s his woman.

I don’t think it’s duty in itself that prevents them from accepting, but specifically the suggestion that they might have preferred someone else. If they were just a wartime alliance sealer with no Brandon and no Other Woman in the picture, then I don’t think they have any problems accepting anything. Love is supposed to come with time anyway. But the power of suggestion is strong. I see that as insecurity more than anything, I think it makes them sad but not necessarily more guarded about feeling what they feel.

Cat thinks at some point how a part of Ned will always be hidden from her. She says part of him is in that tree and she could never have that part. I think maybe she thought part of Ned belongs to the Other Woman too. And though she accepts, she is also sad. I guess that’s what I mean by pining. Ned is harder to read but you can make a similar argument. The possessiveness is implicit in the seeming wish to “have” more of him. And as for Ned, his possessiveness is really overt in his interactions with Littlefinger. His very familiarity with Cat gets on Ned’s nerves. Cat was Brandon’s and now she is his, LF wasn’t even invited and is being super presumptuous.

It’s irrational, it’s not exactly Zen, but they’re only human.

[onionjulius]

Unpopular opinions, Robb was a lot like Ned and people ignore this to try to make Jon more of a Stark Bran is the rightful king in the north and he will rule in the end Jaimie is not a good man and if it wasn’t for his charm he would be completely loathed Sansan is disgusting no matter how you look at it

Robb: strongly agree | agree | neutral | disagree | strongly disagree 

While I think Robb is temperamentally more similar to Cat (confident, assertive, action-oriented), he clearly is all Ned’s in terms of governing and cultural education. Naturally there is going to be a lot of similarity. Is Jon more similar to Ned than Robb? I mean, you can make the argument, I think he is in some ways, but it’s not a zero-sum game really. As for people ignoring it, yes I have seen people say that Robb is more of a Tully and also link this to his failures while contrasting Jon as the more Stark-like and worthwhile young leader. I am not sure that most people think that way, but it has come up, yes.

Bran: strongly agree | agree | neutral | disagree | strongly disagree

Technically of course Bran is the rightful king by the norms of the North. But I’m really bad at endgame predictions and also they’re not the most interesting thing to me, especially when it comes to who rules. Most characters’ stories have not really involved learning how to rule, so it’s hard for me to care too much about an antiquated and oppressive system of governance. That said, I love Bran and if that happens I am down with it and I hope Martin gives him a peaceful and fruitful reign as lord. Mostly I just hope the Stark kids end up together and safe and can heal, that’s what their mom and dad would have wanted ;__; (My exception to the rulers thing is Edmure, I want him to get Riverrun back simply because he loves it and he is my woobie of choice.)

Jaime: strongly agree | agree | neutral | disagree | strongly disagree

I don’t think I’d call him a good man. But I do think he has undergone moral evaluations and changes. I do definitely agree that charm helps a character get a second chance from readers. Whether that means being funny, being attractive, being badass, etc. Without it I believe Jaime would be loathed by at least more people than do loathe him now.

SanSan: strongly agree | agree | neutral | disagree | strongly disagree

I can see dark and even disturbing, but disgusting is not the word that comes to my mind. From what I’ve read from shippers, you can make the argument that what people ultimately seem to want for them is fantasy, but it doesn’t gross me out. I don’t have a strong emotional reaction to the ship either way tbh, it’s a ship and a fandom that I kind of just watch from a distance.

[onionjulius]

Since you have been talking about Ned and Catelyn, what do you think about their relationship? Do you think their relationship ever had in passion in it? Do you think they were in love "in love" or just loved each other? (Your thoughts outside of the Jon Snow situation. So, many people define their relationship by Jon, but I want your thoughts on them as couple, romance.)

Hrmm, well, that’s a bit of a rabbit hole as that all kinda depends on what you mean by those words. If passion means physical intensity, then yes I think they had some. If you put two teenagers together who never had much if any sex before and tell them nobody’s stopping them any more, there’s a good chance they’re going to go for it pretty enthusiastically. Just look at Robb and Jeyne. Sex is just a thing that lots of people like to do at some point in their lives. If by passion you mean really strong emotions, then yes I think so also, we can see it pretty clearly IMO from Cat’s viewpoint. We don’t hear as much from Ned so technically you can interpret his side whatever way you want within reason. My only note there is that some people consider love as a reflection of how worthy the beloved is, while other people consider love as an indication of how loving the lover is. Passion also has certain specific connotations though; if you mean something uncontrollable, I don’t think of their feelings for each other exactly as uncontrollable. There wasn’t really any obstacle that would force them to control their emotions overly much. Also, I think they could control themselves insofar as they would keep their feelings pretty private. I don’t see them being excessively emotional or physical in public. They’re controlled people. Even in some AU where Ned survives AGOT and goes to the Wall and they can’t be together any more, I don’t think he would die with grief, and I don’t think she would die with grief, and if Robb told her to I think she would even marry again if she had to (although I don’t think he would make her if she didn’t absolutely have to). Now you can always say that deep inside they could still keep feeling their feelings for each other. But is it passion if it doesn’t light kingdoms on fire? Because I don’t think they’d let the world burn just to be together.

It’s difficult for me to answer questions like this succinctly because IMO it all depends on what you mean by love, or what the difference is supposed to be between “love” and “in love”. People see these things differently. I happen to not believe in the idea of one true love, they are two very compatible people and I don’t think every alternative for either would have worked out just as well. But I can’t say that I am certain that positively nobody could make them just as happy. But I think the history of loving, as a verb, is more important than this idea of finding “the one”. I don’t think of my husband as “the one” and I don’t think he thinks of me that way, so you’re asking someone who comes at it from that perspective. If you ask someone who wants the Helen of Troy feeling, then I imagine they wouldn’t find Ned and Cat fulfilling? Like, by “in love” a lot of people mean infatuation, some degree of obsession, possessiveness, etc. But that stuff doesn’t always last past the first stages of a relationship, and yet there is more out there (although I will say that I happen to think that they both still have an amount of possessiveness in their feelings for each other, I don’t know if they would have eventually outgrown that because, you know, they’re dead). The word I first thought of and still think most of to describe their love is abiding. It’s there when you need it. 

Now, GRRM, is not me, he’s a true romantic (not flowers and candy; rather, longing, melancholy, nostalgia, individualistic heroism, etc). So when you posit “romance” as separate from the Jon Snow situation, I think that means you probably mean romance in a different way than GRRM would. For GRRM (I read this somewhere but I can’t think of the exact quote now, however it’s not an uncommon sentiment from a romantic!), I would bet money that he would say that it’s the sadness in their relationship that helps to shape their romance. In Cat’s second chapter she mentions the shadows that lay between them, her dead fiance and his illegitimate son’s mother. This obstacle gives each of them a reason to pine, even within the confines of a fairly happy marriage. And it makes it of interest to GRRM who, again, is just a melancholy romantic. 

This probably isn’t the answer you were looking for? I don’t mean to evade your questions, and I can say that I think that Ned and Cat are more “in love” than Jorah was with his first wife:

“I suppose I came to love her after a fashion, though our relations were dutiful rather than passionate. Three times she miscarried while trying to give me an heir. The last time she never recovered. She died not long after.”

I don’t think Ned and Cat would ever say “Oh, I suppose I came to love him/her after a fashion.” Although, again, does that say more about how perfect the match was/wasn’t, or how emotionally intelligent and grounded Jorah is? Anyway if I haven’t answered your question well feel free to follow up. It’s just hard for me to give a simple answer because I think love is one of the main themes of the series and I don’t think it’s treated in a simple way there.

[onionjulius]

adelequested replied to your post “You know what bums me out, even though I play into it? It bums me out...”

if the show was just a bit better Tormund/Jaime/Brienne could provide some material. In the books, I had a vague impression Martin was positioning Ser Hyle as a bit of a replacement Jaime - if Martin ever got round to give him a bit of a redemption arc, and have Brienne develop the slightest interest, which at this point is unlikely. Too minor a character for now, had to look up the name.

Yeah, I remember thinking of Ser Hyle as a back-up plan, of course it retreads the Jaime-Brienne dynamic though but it’s still nice to know that Brienne has options, lol. (I am in a supremely awkward position fandom-wise of liking both Jaime/Cersei and Jaime/Brienne and so I always feel like I have to disclaim things constantly--I found the idea of Ser Hyle as a spare nice, though clearly not superior, because of caring about Brienne herself and not because it would take an obstacle out of the Jaime/Cersei path. Like, I agree with J/C fans that Jaime’s probably going to die with Cersei somehow, but I agree with J/B fans that this doesn’t mean that Jaime isn’t allowed to and hasn’t grown away from Cersei--anyway since I think J is doomed I hope B doesn’t spend her whole life pining is all. And the fact that I feel that I have to disclaim this much goes back to what I was saying about all this fighting over dudes, lol. But I guess it shouldn’t stop me from talking.) I feel like show-only fans could give Tormund an equal chance (you know, if the series wasn’t ending “soon” and if he wasn’t also a fairly secondary character) but book-first fans might find it hard to shake that “replacement’ feeling.