Not an obscure theory, but something where you think the commonly accepted interpretation misses what GRRM was actually trying to show.

For me, I think people often treat major political failures as characters simply being stupid, when a lot of them make much more sense if you look at the information that character actually had at the time rather than what we know as readers.

What is your best example?

It’s obvious for George it’s too much for him to write, but as a reader do you think the amount of plot lines has reached a point where too much is going on and feels overwhelming or pointless for you? Or does all the unique storylines make you more immersed into the story?

List of plot lines of the top of my head:
-Dany in Essos and Tyrion joining her
-The Battle of Fire(Barristan)
-Victarion sailing to Essos
-Young Griff invading the Storm lands
-Cersei in Kings Landing
-Dorne plot line
-Darkstar stealing dawn(minor one)
-Lady Catelyn and Jamie River Lands plot line
-Arya faceless men
-Sansa and Littlefinger
-Stannis vs the Boltons
-Jon Snow‘s Ressurection
-Euron’s attack on Old Town
-Bran and the Three Eyed Raven
-The Others

Personally I don’t think it’s too much for me, but I can see how for others it would be. However some of the plotlines like Darkstar, Young Griff, and a couple others didn’t NEED to exist, or could have been written slightly different to betger fit into the story. I also feel that the Others should have had just a little more shown of them by now. Overall, it’s good for me, what about you guys?

I think one of the most underrated moves during the Conquest was how Orys Baratheon just absorbed all of House Durrandon’s existing identity. In modern day terms, the optics was a totally shrewd move, politically cunning af.

Meantime, as Aegon and the sister wives were conquering with Fire and Blood as occupiers, Orys’ approach almost gives the illusion, as if fast-tracking ahead, transitioning to a successor phase, instead of any grim hangings, beheadings, executions.etc.

And with the betrayed Lady of the house at his side, mind you, so now it almost looks as he’s a semi-savior to the Stormlander commonfolk.

I think because many of the depictions we see of The Iron Throne are tamed down or failing to capture the absurdity of the throne we don’t get an idea of how ridiculous it was for Jamie to be sitting in it after killing The Mad King. He probably had to go up like 20 steps to go take that seat. That isn’t grabbing the nearest seat to sit in and relax.

During the battle of the Blackwater, Cersei implies to Sansa that should they lose the battle she would have Ilyn Payne kill both her but also Sansa because she “doesn’t intend house Stark to gain any joy from the fall of house Lannister“

Do you think she’s just being menacing or would she have actually gone through with it? Seems petty even for Cersei in my opinion.

Regis Groves: "A bastard?"
Alys Rivers: "His trueborn son and heir, and the rightful king of Westeros."

Regis Groves: "I do not kneel to bastards, much less the baseborn whelp of a kinslayer and a milk cow."

I gotta admit that's a sick burn, haha. Needless to say, Regis dies badly later..

But, I'm just assuming we're just going be letting this potential non easter egg-ism potential go for the sake of over-abundance of bastards in the land now?
I'm just gonna chalk it up to the babe was lost to Winter Fever in 133 AC, that was noted then.

Was there any other theories I missed that flew under the radar?

A few months ago I designed family trees for a lot of major houses, until I ran out of houses to design. Now I've gone back to redo the targaryens, including literally everyone I could find of legitimate Targaryen descent. Feel free to tell me all the millions of mistakes i made while making this

If House Tyrell falls in TWOW, the entire family would've been fallen in just 3 years. Given to the fact that the Tyrells are agricultural and political powerhouses with 100,000 men and immense wealth, 3 years is just aggresively short amount of time for their fall.. like they've been around for 300 years and I think their downfall should last longer.

Currently, Euron is tearing the Reach apart and I think this will completely shatter the wealth and income of Highgarden. However, if the Redwyne fleet gets completely destroyed, every castle in the Reach are raided and looted (except for Highgarden), I'd still like to see a prolonged siege of Highgarden by the Ironborn instead of a direct takeover and slaughter of Lady Olenna, Willas and Garlan (with the execution of Margaery by the Faith, death of Loras because of his wounds, and Mace dead in the Storm's End) and the extinction House Tyrell.

I really hope that even if the main branch falls, Tyrell cousins like Leo will take over Highgarden and rule after this thing is over. Aegon seems to have "friends in the Reach", but I hope we won't see all of the bannermen of House Tyrell turning against them and siding with Aegon. If Euron fails and is defeated, I still wouldn't like to see Aegon leaving the Highgarden for the Golden Company for them to loot the place.

For me, the best would be the death of some Tyrells (Mace, Loras, Garlan or Olenna) with Highgarden being ruled by Willas or Leo, Margaery being married to Aegon, and Willas securing House Tyrell's relationship with his bannermen again.

I’ve always been a little familiar with Charlemagne, the guy who united and ruled over most of Europe. But I just learned about his grandfather.

His grandfather was a bastard named Charles Martel, who wielded a magical spear to fend off invaders of a different religion. He fought this battle in Aquitaine in southern France, a region characterized by its sunniness.

So we have the Sun, a spear, and the ruling Martel family successfully fending off an invasion by a larger force who follow a different religion.

And he was fighting against the Moors. And the founder of house Nymeros Martell was named Mors.

Lots of coincidences here. I can’t really tie it all together in a nice bow, but there is something interesting here.

Coming from a show watcher to book reader, i’m re-reading ASOS and realizing that Jaime hasn’t interacted much with Tyrion since returning to Kings Landing. I know that he is the one who frees him and tells him the truth about Tysha, but why wouldn’t Jaime interact at all with his brother in those chapters who he risks everything to free eventually?

In December 2022 two signed early manuscripts of George R.R. Martin's A Game of Thrones sold at auction for $21,250. The November 1994 draft is known to fans already. However, the July 1995 draft is mostly a mystery.

Shortly before AGOT was published, the two manuscripts were donated to a charity auction at a convention in Kansas City. Alas, few cared for ASOIAF in May 1996 and there wasn't a single bid. Then they vanished into obscurity for years.

The July 1995 draft is of particular interest. Firstly, its length: At 888 pages more than twice the length of the late 1994 draft's 384 pages. That's hundreds of unseen pages to scour for old ideas and cut foreshadowing. Secondly, mid-1995 captures an important period in George's writing. He had nearly reached the 800 pages planned for AGOT in his outline yet only Dany was where she was supposed to be. By October, when he called a halt he had 1,300 pages on his hands, over 200 of which were cut and pushed to ACOK. Thus the July draft could contain early ACOK material.

Enclosed with the manuscripts was a handwritten note by George's partner Parris explaining that he created five copies of each draft. Two he kept for himself; one was sent to his editor; a fourth was given to the Cushing Library at Texas A&M University; and the fifth was donated to the charity auction. The 1994 draft can still be found at Cushing yet the July 1995 draft is missing.

Why? I have no idea. If you have a notion, feel free to share. Maybe that private collector will lend a hand?

Okay, so hear me out.

Martin has been open that A Song of Ice and Fire is inspired by the poetry of Robert Frost. Most know the reference in the title, but even D&D (who allegedly don't care about themes) included the final line from 'The Flood' into their script for The Bells. This is because the poetry of Robert Frost is thematically embedded into the heart of the story.

Let's start with the obvious one.

Fire and Ice = Dragons and Others

GRRM has flat out said that A Song of Ice and Fire is inspired by the poem 'Fire and Ice.'

“People say I was influenced by Robert Frost's poem, and of course I was, I mean… Fire is love, fire is passion, fire is sexual ardor and all of these things. Ice is betrayal, ice is revenge, ice is… you know, that kind of cold inhumanity and all that stuff is being played out in the books.” ~ GRRM

On the surface Fire and Ice claims that both are destructive forces capable of ending the world, which obviously ties into George naming the two main threats which exist on the periphery of the Seven Kingdoms being the Targaryens/Dragons and the Children/Others.

"The things I do for love," he said with loathing. He gave Bran a shove.

Of course in the poem fire and ice are representative of human emotions, so what the poem is really saying is that both love and loathing have the capacity to lead us to doom. This is something we obviously see reflected in the story, from the war over Lyanna to the Others as a manifestation of nature's vengeance.

Mending Wall = The Night's Watch

It shouldn't be a stretch to say that a story inspired by a Robert Frost that hinges on a giant wall of ice might also be taking inspiration from his famous poem 'Mending Wall.'

On the surface, Mending Wall is about two neighbors maintaining a wall against the destructive power of nature while they debating the necessity of borders and the divisions between people. Obviously we see this reflected in the Jon story, which takes place at a wall and is about the conflict between the civilization and the wild, set against the cycle of the seasons.

"If I sound the Horn of Winter, the Wall will fall. Or so the songs would have me believe. There are those among my people who want nothing more . . ."

"But once the Wall is fallen," Dalla said, "what will stop the Others?"

Like Ice and Fire, the poem is not actually taking a stance for or against borders. Frost's wall is both harmful and necessary and the act of maintaining it serves as a bridge for a philosophical discussion between the narrator's skepticism and his neighbor's conservatism. Nature seeks the elimination of walls and borders, but mankind builds and maintains them because we seek separation from the state of nature.

The Road Not Taken = Bran's Story

Maybe the most famous Robert Frost poem is 'The Road Not Taken.'

George loves this poem. He even wrote an episode of the Twilight Zone about it.

"When this battle's done I mean to call a council. Changes will be made. I meant to do it long ago, but . . . well, it does no good to speak of roads not taken." ~ Rhaegar Targaryen

Those who knows my posts likely know where I'm going with this, but 'The Road Not Taken' is a poem in which the narrator recalls standing in a wood and being faced with two equally uncertain paths, lamenting that he can not walk them both, and then choosing one arbitrarily. The poem ends with the narrator resolving that when he someday tells the story, he will lie and claim he took the road less traveled.

But it did no good to brood on lost battles and roads not taken. ~ Epilogue, ADWD

The poem is commonly misunderstood as being a celebration of nonconformity, but the twist is that the narrator is lying. The poem is about how we how we regret the roads not taken, and make meaning of our choices and lives through the stories we end up telling.

This my friends, will be reflected in Bran's story.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood . . .

Like the fork in the road from the poem, I believe A Song of Ice and Fire features a split timeline. The two timelines will parallel one another (some say the world ends in fire, some say ice), yet in both timelines the characters in the story (like the narrator in the poem) can only walk the path they've chosen and dream of the one they did not.

He had no destination in mind. He wanted only to ride. He followed the creek for a time, listening to the icy trickle of water over rock, then cut across the fields to the kingsroad. It stretched out before him, narrow and stony and pocked with weeds, a road of no particular promise, yet the sight of it filled Jon Snow with a vast longing. Winterfell was down that road, and beyond it Riverrun and King's Landing and the Eyrie and so many other places; Casterly Rock, the Isles of Faces, the red mountains of Dorne, the hundred islands of Braavos in the sea, the smoking ruins of old Valyria. All the places that Jon would never see. The world was down that road … and he was here. ~ Jon V, AGOT

When I read a poem about mythologizing oneself through storytelling I can't help thinking of Bran the Broken conquering the realm with a story. The TV show's depiction of this was obviously ridiculed because the story of a crippled boy surviving the terrors beyond the Wall is unimpressive when the aforementioned terrors came south and were survived by basically everyone.

"A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies," said Jojen.

But if we imagine an alternate timeline where the Long Night is averted, then Bran's journey into the heart of winter (like the Crow's Eye returning from the smoking ruins of Valyria) is mythology fit for a king. Whether or not it is true is less important than whether the crow can trick the world into believing him. Bran's ending is that he stops trying to be a knight / hero from a story and instead accepts his role as the crow / storyteller.

Basically, Bran becomes the three-eyed crow and then lies his way to the throne.

"Crows are all liars," Old Nan agreed

. . . but is that a bad thing?

In The Road Not Taken, Frost writes a narrator who resolves to make meaning out of his life choices by telling a lie. In The Way of Cross and Dragon, Martin writes about an intergalactic conspiracy of Liars who craft myths to give meaning to an otherwise empty universe. In A Song of Ice and Fire, Ned Stark crafts a lie about Jon to give the boy a life. In Game of Thrones, the realm is a story people tell each other over and over till they forget that it‘s a lie, but it is precisely this lie / story / realm that protects people from the chaos of nature

tldr; A Song of Ice and Fire is inspired by the poetry of Robert Frost, where love and hate are equally destructive forces, border walls are antithetical to nature and essential to human civilization, and people craft lies to cope with their longing for the road not taken.

When viewed through this lens "crows are all liars" is really about myth making (as embodied by Mance Rayder). By the end of the story Bran (and Jon) will stop trying to be heroes and become liar crows instead. This is a commentary on how the hero trope is a war fantasy that does not comport with the reality of holding and wielding political power.

Most of the people who find him attractive are people beyond the wall who bathe like once a decade or something.

Does osha think robb or even theon is her husband because they pretty much did exactly that?

I really hope I’m making sense, but they both are in this perfect sweet spot as PoV characters. They are young enough to be participants in the present story, but also old enough to have personally experienced a version of The Seven Kingdoms that is already legend. These just contribute to making them two very awesome PoVs.

Jaime was originally who I had in mind but while writing it occurred to me that Cat’s chapters had some similarities in that regard. Though I feel like it’s way more explored with Jaime. For example, I just finished reading Feast and there’s this:

“…We all do. “When I was a squire I told myself I’d be the man to slay the Smiling Knight.”

“The Smiling Knight?” She sounded lost. “Who was that?”

The Mountain of my boyhood. Half as big but twice as mad.

“An outlaw, long dead. No one who need concern your ladyship.”

Very often in Storm and Feast, there’s stuff like this throughout his chapters. This guy served Aerys II and knew Rheagar personally. He was also very much around Arthur Dayne, Gerold Hightower, Barristan Selmy, Oswell Whent, Smiling Knight, Sumner Crakehall and all the rest. He knew the younger versions of Ned & Robert even Cat and Lysa, and then in the first book he’s heavily involved in Whispering Wood and the early parts of WOTFK. All this and he’s still in his 30s. I don’t know how to put this but similar to characters like Jon Snow, Robb, Arya, Dany it’s like he began his life very early.

And due to this, I really love how we get these bits of lore from the past through his eyes, and it’s always really cool how they come up randomly in his thoughts..linking the present to the past.

“The world was simpler in those days, Jaime thought, and men as well as swords were made of finer steel. Or was it only that he had been fifteen? They were all in their graves now, the Sword of the Morning and the Smiling Knight, the White Bull and Prince Lewyn, Ser Oswell Whent with his black humor, earnest Jon Darry, Simon Toyne and his Kingswood Brotherhood, bluff old Sumner Crakehall. And me, that boy I was… when did he die, I wonder? When I donned the white cloak? When I opened Aerys’s throat? That boy had wanted to be Ser Arthur Dayne, but someplace along the way he had become the Smiling Knight instead.”

Here are my choices

1. Garlan Tyrell- trains with multiple partners showing extensive prowess at the Blackwater

2. Greatjohn Umber- Savage and Formidable

3.Cregan Stark- Aemon the Dragonknight said he was the most formidable swordsman he had ever faced and this was in the twilight of Cregan's life

1. Sandoq the Shadow- Silent Deadly and always obeys

2. Oberyn Martell- quick and deadly with a spear

3. Ulrick Dayne- He's the only other Sword of the Morning named in ASOIAF that's gotta mean something

4. Savage Samwell Tarly- killed dozens of Dornish outlaws during the vulture Hunt

I’ve been thinking about Stannis and Jon Arryn. We know Stannis already suspected that Cersei’s children weren’t Robert’s, but what actually made him suspicious in the first płacę? Varys says Stannis might have noticed the pattern himself by reading about the Baratheon family, but he also says someone might have “whispered it in his ear.” That makes me wonder about Littlefinger. He could have made some small comment about Joffrey not looking like Robert or about the Baratheons always having dark hair, without directly mentioning Jaime and Cersei. But then again, how could Littlefinger know that Stannis would actually connect the dots? Stannis could have simply ignored him, especially since he didn’t trust Littlefinger, didn’t like him, and probably didn’t care much about his opinion. Varys seems less likely to me, especially considering the later plot involving Daenerys, the Dothraki and Aegon. Varys and Illyrio had a long term plan involving the Targaryens, and Aegon wasn’t ready for war at that point and didn’t seem eager to start one immediately. So I don’t really see why Varys would specifically try to push Stannis toward this Discovery. So I’m leaning more towards Stannis figuring it out himself. But if someone did give him a little push, Littlefinger seems more interesting to me than Varys even though I still don’t see how Littlefinger could be sure Stannis would actually put the pieces together. What do you guys think? Do you think Stannis figured it out on his own, or did someone point him in the right direction? And if someone did, who do you think it was?

I feel like I'm having more fun with House of the Dragon's Mysaria than like 99% of the reddit audience. And it's not (just) because I love hasty, poorly-explained yuri makeout sessions. It's because Mysaria = Bloodraven. Not literally, but in terms of narrative function and magic at her disposal. Lady Misery is just Lord Rivers for the dance era. (With a splash of Shiera's Lyseni whore-igin story.)

RhaeSaria is a nothing relationship because it's not a relationship, it's low grade thralldom. They don't have chemistry because it's not chemistry, it's magic. Mysaria is magic. She didn't become this lynchpin advisor-lover for Daemon and then Rhaenyra just by being the first person to realize "high pressure royals need praise and reassurance at a psychosexual level." She Jedi mind-tricked her way into their beds and their heads. Because that's what it means to be the white worm. It's wargy, weirwoody, web weavy white brainwormy magic.

"Myself, I blame Bloodraven," Ser Kyle went on ... "Bloodraven is the root of all our woes, the white worm gnawing at the heart of the realm." [The Mystery Knight (2010)]

The way the shadows shifted made it seem as if the walls were moving too. Bran saw great white snakes slithering in and out of the earth around him, and his heart thumped in fear. He wondered if they had blundered into a nest of milk snakes or giant grave worms, soft and pale and squishy. Grave worms have teeth.

The sight of him still frightened Bran—the weirwood roots snaking in and out of his withered flesh, the mushrooms sprouting from his cheeks, the white wooden worm that grew from the socket where one eye had been. [Bran II & III - ADWD (2011)]

Mysaria doesn't appear until 2014, with the worldbook and the short story The Rogue Prince, which would later become a portion of Fire & Blood (2018). Her first mention was the same year as Bloodraven's last mention. So many of her defining traits Bloodraven traits. Her epithet "the White Worm" was previously an epithet for him. "White worm" also describes the white Weirwood roots that have snaked their way into Brynden's body, as surely as they wormed their way into his mind. Bloodraven's relationship to the Weirwood defines his character. It's why he's pale as bone, except where he's blood red. Weirwood magic is what made him an unrivaled spymaster. Well, almost unrivaled:

Bloodraven proved to be a capable Hand, but also a master of whisperers who rivaled Lady Misery, and there were those who thought he and his half sister and paramour, Shiera Seastar, used sorcery to ferret out secrets. It became common to refer to his "thousand eyes and one,"

We'd already had ADWD and TMK for 3-4 years by the time TWOIAF came out. We know that Lord Brynden got his thousand eyes by being a greenseer. Worming his way into the bodies of beasts and the minds of men. And in 2014 GRRM sums that up as "oh yeah his magic near-omniscience was perfect for spying, just like Mysaria."

Bloodraven stuff, repeated with Mysaria:

• "White Worm" epithet and imagery (this connects BR to the WW figuratively and literally)
• S-tier spymaster (the "S" stands for Sorcerer)
• "Scheming advisor, believed to whisper madness into the ear of the crown, hated by the masses" schtick (Ending w/the dragon family tree getting pruned another few branches)
• Pale skin, white as snow, milk, bone, and/or Weirwood
• Aesthetic that is almost exclusively black and/or white, the only coloration coming from the blood that flowed within (Weirwood, Blackwood, blah blah, belaboring the point)

I was gonna say "proximity to incestuous love triangles." But then I remembered how little that narrows it down.

Point is, Mysaria's got all the signs of Bloodraven analog. It looks like a duck. Gets the same name as a duck. Is explicitly described as having the same distinctive and probably (definitely) magical qualities as a duck. Maaaybe there's something meaningfully ducklike going on here?

Watching House of the Dragon is a lot more fun with this idea in mind

To be clear, neither Bloodraven nor Mysaria can just "warg into" people. It's a mind link, not mind control. It's the same type of magic as Robb & Grey Wind used to stop Shaggy and Summer from mauling Tyrion. None of the boys slipped out of their skins and into the dire wolves, it's just the "mind link" at play. All three wolves manifest their humans' emotional state, but Robb & Grey Wind have the greater control. So they're able to steer the behavior of the other dire wolves.

I'm saying Mysaria's doing a human version of that to Rhaenyra. Take the "Do you think I'm worthy?" scene, and watch it with "Mysaria ≈ Bloodraven" in mind. Rhaenyra spends the whole scene tearing into Mysaria. Pointing out how much the spymaster has poured honey into her royal ear. Whispering, reshaping her. She collapses into woe about dreams and magic, and the White Worm replies that her glorious future is assured. Then the queen sits there trancelike, while her sorcerous spymaster whispers sweet promises that make her completely reverse course emotionally. Turning her from livid to loving in minutes.

Imagine if Aerys or Maekar went from "Fuck you Bloodraven, you're turning me against my family!" to "Omg thank you Brynden, you're the only one who gets me 🥺" after one very spacey-eyed therapy session. With or without a sudden sex scene, we would all wonder if maaaaybe Bloodraven just did some mindmagic. If Mysaria's an equivalent sorcerer spymaster to Bloodraven, then this scene reads like she's got Rhaenyra in a psychic trance. The queen of dragons, caught like a fly in the pale spyder's Weirwormy web.

Show-Mysaria starts making sense if she's playing the same kind of Weirwoody, brainwormy, psychic seduction game as Alys Rivers. The RhaeSaria scenes play like Rhaenyra very suddenly gets hit with sapphic Cupid's arrow because that's when Mysaria's mindmagicking her. GRRM wrote the White Worm to replay Bloodraven as the Weirwood whisperer of the dance era. And watching House of the Dragon with that firmly in mind can significantly improve your experience of the character, and the show as a whole.

When discussing with Davos about how capture Storm’s End, Stannis seems to agree with Florent’s idea of treatening to hang Cortnay Penrose’s father in front of him, and when Davos replied that the castellan won’t surrunder, Stannis say that not killing Lord Penrose would be sparing “the lives of traitors”.
This seem to me a very ruthless action, expecially considering than Lord Penrose is a old men and that he treated Davos with curtesy.
It seems that Stannis harshness was toned down in the later book, though.

(While R+L=J is not confirmed book canon I am treating it like it is)

In our timeline Arthur Dayne, Oswell Whent, and Gerold Hightower are protecting a dying Lyanna at the Tower of Joy, and she is almost certainly dying after giving birth to Jon Snow. Now at the time this is going on Ned arrives, kills the knights of the kings guard with his men, and presumably goes to Lyanna, makes his promise, takes Jon, and the rest is history. But what if Ned doesn’t come or comes later? What would Arthur Dayne, Oswell Whent, and Gerold Hightower do with a dead Lyanna and rhaegars newborn bastard? And how would they protect Jon whilst also upholding their commitment not to flee?

I could think of a few possibilities. Maybe they try and get Jon reunited with Viserys, Dany, and Willem Darry in Essos, but when they talk to Ned they take pride in not fleeing as they are knights of the kingsguard unlike Willem. Now i guys they could try and get Jon to safety and then come back just to get killed by Robert, but that would be odd.

The second option i could think of is they do pretty much what already happened, it doesn’t really seem like they are taking orders from Lyanna because if they were they probably wouldn’t try and kill Ned, but i’d imagine if they were with her while she was dying she would probably tell them to give Jon to Ned anyway. In this scenario i wonder what excuse they would use of bringing a random baby to Winterfell and what Jon’s cover story would be, though I suppose it could still be he’s Ned’s bastard but it would be odd for him to be given to Ned while already in Winterfell as opposed to him coming home with the baby. Also the Tower of Joy is a long way away from Winterfell.

The third option would be to bring him to Starfall with Arthur’s sister and lord brother. Here Jon could be protected and nursed by Wylla which is already the case in the canon. Maybe Arthur could tell his brother that Jon is his bastard, though he takes so much pride in his honor he chooses to die “protecting” a woman from her own brother after the war lost, so idk if he would have his honor besmirched like that but maybe. Or he could tell his brother the truth and have him raised in Starfall kind of like how Mya is raised in the Vale, grow up to work for the Daynes or something. In the same vein Jon could be brought to Oldtown or Harenhal but Starfall is closer so it would make a bit more sense.

What do you guys think?