Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 77 - ADWD Jon XI

Episode Date: January 10, 2020

New year, same Jon POV, and Jon continuing with the same problems of trying to get a bunch of different people to get along at the Wall. Seems the brothers who said the same vows as him have different ideas of what it means.    Intro by Anton Langhage ---   Eliana's twitter: https://twitter.com/arhythmetric   Eliana's reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/glass_table_girl   Eliana's blog: https://themanyfacedblog.wordpress.com/   Chloe's twitter: https://twitter.com/liesandarbor   Chloe's blog: www.liesandarborgold.com

Hello and welcome to Girls Gone Canon, episode 77, John 11 in A Dance with Dragons. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. You might know me from the internet as Liza Narber on Twitter, Tumblr, or LizaNarberGold.com. And I am another one of your hosts, Eliana. You might know me as GlossTableGirl on Reddit. Maybe you know me as Averith Metric metric over on twitter we are making this episode happen right now yes absolutely i'm listening to eliana speak into my ear on a phone it sounds like a radio caller hello caller what's your issue uh my internet my internet is not working but here we are you guys we took a little break gave you some time to catch up and here we are. You guys, we took a little break, gave you some time to catch up, and here we are.

After tonight's Jon Snow episode, we will have two Jon episodes left until he dies. Man, remember when we thought we were going to be done with Jon in September or October? Yeah,

I do. Thanks for reminding me. We were such sweet summer children. Literally, it was summertime when we thought all these things. We sure were. And, you know, honestly, we started off doing a bunch of the double episodes, which we haven't announced our new POV yet. Stay tuned for that in the next couple weeks. We didn't want to be too heavy-handed with the hinting.

So just, you you know pay attention you might hear a couple things here and there's some clues but in the meantime uh we're finishing up with john and it just got so lengthy right like we went from doing these double two chapter episodes to oh no i guess things actually happen here i mean a lot of them are pretty dense like i've been noticing that a lot of these john chapters in dance it feels like what he goes through four different encounters through them like in the last one he goes through three of them it'll be like i don't know person right and then like talking to axel and then maybe talking to Selyse and then going and talking to Bowen and whomever. And here this one, it's like Dormin, Val, Selyse, Bowen, you know?

The boomer gang. Yeah, at the end, every single time. And Amy and it's, they're dense, you know, because you're covering a lot of different things happening. And I mean, they're dense, you know, because you're covering a lot of different things happening. Yeah, mixed in with a bunch of exposition and world building for the free folk, which there's tons of here, and mixed in with a lot of foreshadowing. Tons of foreshadowing, in my opinion, for stuff to come. So I am excited to dig into this chapter. Actually, when we started outlining and talking about different things in this chapter together, I was like, Oh shit, this is like a really good chapter.

There is a lot to talk about. It's thick. Yeah. A lot of things do happen. I think, you know, I was talking about this with some folks like, you know, on our, our friends on the Nauticast podcast, right. And some of the other reddit mods and like it feels as though to me i kind of get why people think i don't i don't agree like i think that dance has a lot of really strong thematic work going on that i can see how people might find maybe john and danny's chapters boring i don't think that's the case but for both of them right you can see that as we've been going through a lot of these Jon chapters, a lot of them hit the same thematic

note, if that makes sense. They're rehashing the same issue. But I mean, it's always coming at the problem in new ways. And I think here's where things start picking up after Alice Karstark shows up. I was actually speaking with one of our friends from the not a cast podcast jeff about this chapter just a little bit ago um it's it's a crazy night we're all doing john tonight wow yep it is uh the boys of not a cast podcast are doing john three in clash is it i think something like that john three uh so they're doing john we're doing, it's just a flat out mess in here. Sinful mess. And Jeff was talking about how some of John's last chapters were very, very, very rushed because of the cadence of how George had to get the chapters to the editor. And that, you know, each time he

got them in, he was like, there's just one more John chapter. And of course, we know what happens in that John chapter. He kind of had to rush and fill in the blanks in between so i think that might explain a lot of that do it all over again the same plot but in a different location with different people thing going on with john and truly and maybe it's just this chapter we're about to discuss but i really did feel the growth in this chapter. I felt John actually politically paying attention to what he needed to do, how he needed to speak, how he needed to win certain people over,

and it's different from the boy that sat on the bench at the feast, drunk and mad, you know? For sure. He's now the person on the other end of the table, and he's trying to make space for other people at the table, too. Absolutely.

And it's not easy. And apparently when you try to stick up for good people and good things, sometimes you get killed. Yeah. Looking at you, Kevin Spacey's accusers. Whoa. Whoa. All four of them. What?

Well, that have come out and so of course we know that john 13 is the last chapter for john snow because he dies in this chapter and he's dead and that's it that's the end for john john dies at the end but we're really excited because that chapter which is still two episodes away next week we will have john 12 for you. But John 13, we have a guest coming on. We do have a special guest. And I'm quite excited for this one. This is another one of our good friends, of course. But from a long time back, she's played a big role in your fandom life, right, Chloe?

Yeah. Oh, my gosh. She really got me into A Song of ice and fire twitter it is our very good friend the lady shelly if you follow her shelly uh if you guys have a facebook you might know the meme page the page of many faces she was uh the weeping woman on the page of many faces when it was more active and yeah the lady shelly on, the biggest Pats fan in the world and arguably the biggest Jon Snow fan in the world. So we couldn't end Jon without having Shelly on for an episode. We really could not.

Shelly's great. I've had the opportunity to also meet her in person. And I think she's part of how you and I like came to know one another, too. So exciting to bring it all like together. She really is a very big Jon a very because of your blog name right uh yeah isn't that when you and i became friends is that when we spoke i don't know i think it was just something random on twitter but it might have had to do with like makeup and the song of ice and fire i was like oh i relate to both these things. The foundation of any friendship. Literally foundation.

The undertones of our friendship. Speaking of foundational friendship, really excited to have Shelley on, but we do have more content coming to you this month. Not just Jonisodes. Not as good as Netisodes. Not at all. We have an episode of our His dark materials series continuing on we are starting

the subtle knife we are and so the subtle knife is book two of course of the his dark materials series which as many of you know we started a read-through of and we of course just finished wrapping up our coverage of the first season, which actually has a little bit of stuff from the Subtle Knife. So fun stuff, but we're going to try and keep our read through for the Subtle Knife same as we were doing with the Golden Compass where the first part is mostly spoiler free. And then we have a discussion at the end a dust discussion for those of you who have not finished the extraneous books the books of dust uh there's a dusty discussion at the very

end where i discuss i dust discuss that that's a lot of discussing uh but we also have a regular discussion for those of you that have not yet read the amber spyglass but if you are like i am i expect you guys will have sped ahead while you waited for us to finish uh finish the season and get back into it so stay tuned for that and we also have a patreon episode coming to you guys this month yeah we can actually announce this one early this time because we you guys this is this is big for us we had an idea for this patreon episode like a whole month before we even did it like look at us maybe we're growing 2020 maybe it's our year maybe not who knows new year same us yeah actually same But, so we do have a patron episode.

And if you haven't checked it out, of course, if you like His Dark Materials, our previous patron episode for December closing out 2019 was about the lantern slides that are at the end of the three main books of His Dark Materials. Yeah, and that was a really fun episode to explore those lantern slides because it turned out you and I were looking at

different lantern slides. Which I only found out like an hour before or less. Making magic. But thank you for listening to that, patrons. A reminder that all of our patrons, $5 and up, do get to listen to a special that all of our patrons five dollars and up do get to listen

to a special episode their ears only uh check that out patreon.com slash girls gone canon but this month we are doing in a song of ice and fire themed episode for our song of ice and fire patreon fans and we are doing an episode about the maiden vault era of Targaryen. So this is going to include Elena, Rhaena, and Diana Targaryen, and Aegon the Unworthy, Aegon IV, and of course, Baelor. Baelor. And maybe we'll even talk a little bit

about Aemon the Dragon Knight. Maybe even Daeron. Wow. A lot of people that can be discussed around the Maidenvault. Yes. Lots to do in the maiden vault and who else better to visit the maiden vault with than us so feel free to tune in with us again patreon.com slash girls gone canon we give you a special patron only episode every month check it out yes and i, you know, we have these Patreon episodes, but along with that, there's

something to celebrate that's not just the new year. We touched on this a little in our previous Patreon episode, but you guys, we have 100 public episodes, including this one, now 101. Like Dalmatians. Yes. Each one of these episodes, a small puppy. Oh, I wish. We did 67 public episodes last year.

That's wild. That's really crazy. Why did we do that? I don't know. That's crazy. Now that I think, now that you say it like that, I'm like, that's more than there are weeks. That's, yeah, that's more than one a week.

I think, obviously, the His Dark Materials episodes, we really doubled up on as we got closer, put our nose to the grind. Thanks so much for listening, you guys. 101 public Dalmatians. That is mind blowing. I'm going to call them Dalmatians now. So in 100 more, I'm going to be like, we have 201 public Dalmatians. 2019, the year that marks the Dalmatians of podcasts.

These Dalmatians are out of control. We got an email from our good friend Michael Yaney and he said I was just reading John 8, A Game of Thrones and in the narration, John

says something described as stupidly. This reminded me of Jon 3 when he stupidly argued with Benjen and your analysis of it. I began to think about how it's interesting that Jon chapters have multiple instances of this in the narration and how each character's narration fits their perspective. I then did a search of stupidly, and it only comes up nine times in all five books six times it is used to describe someone slash something else two times in john the only other time it is used in narration to describe the pov is sansa one a storm of swords i don't think it necessarily means anything but i

think it would be really cool if you did a patreon episode analyzing how the POVs affect their own narrative style and the similarities slash contrasts between different characters. Oh, I like that a lot. It actually reminds me of this panel from 2017 Ice and Fire Con. I want to say it was Pork Winton and

Butterfly from A Song of Ice and Fire University on Tumblr, and they did a panel about following like the the POV as a camera so like Quentin and Sansa for example are really good camera lenses to view stories through and see different things through and it was just such interesting work and I think the way that we are reading this story reading it in a linear pov chapter by pov chapter way is a lot different obviously than just reading the books and highlights a lot of those things i know we talk about john and zanza pretty often just because they have similar themes in some of these chapters

and of course john and theon and john and the character that's coming up next which i cannot tell you yet um but that'd be a fun episode i have a lot of ideas so we might have another patron episode to write eliana wow we look at us 2020 maybe it really is a new year and new us but yeah and i mean along with what you're saying and that it's worth noting that george has said that the povs that are hardest for him to write seem to be brand the younger POVs. Because, of course, he's trying to get into the sort of mindset that a child might have. And so how does that manifest right in the writing? What does he do to call out that this is a younger perspective or child versus some of the older ones that we have?

Yeah, different framework he uses. We see a lot of similar devices in Ned chapters and John chapters, right? And Sansa chapters where we start in the middle of the chapter, and they spend a lot of time on their head and the words they say out loud are very calculated. Things like that, and some of the framework that they use on themselves. I love exploring that. So we'll definitely do some exploring of that in the future. That could be interesting exploring, yeah, some of those older people. Even like Barristan, John Connington, all these people with regrets. So anyways, sorry, this is going to go in an episode apparently one day.

So got to try and hold back. Ready to rip right here. Thanks for sending us an email on that, Michael. You guys, if you ever want to send us an email and just chat, talk about your day, send us pictures of your animals, send us memes, talk about characters, you can do that. We have an email address, girlsgonecanon, C-A-N-O-N, at gmail.com. Or you can send us a message or a tweet over at Twitter. Same name, girlsgonecanon, C-A-N-O-N, at gmail.com. Or you could send us a message or a tweet over at Twitter. Same name, girlsguncanon. Yes.

But while you think about anything you might want to say, we do have a lightning round. A lightning round. Zap, zap. First up. First up. First up. First up 2020.

I'm like doing some sit-ups. It's our first 2020 lightning round all right daenerys seven on the eve of the grand reopening of the fighting pits daenerys entertains with her husband hisdar at a feast for meronese nobles she then consults with baristan about the dornish visitors she lets hisdar take her in their marriage bed. Theon won. Theon takes a giant leap to faith, taking back his name and Jane's because you have to remember your name. The crowd goes wild. Fist bumps, fist bumps. Vuvuzelas.

Pew, pew, pew. Pew, pew, pew. Daenerys XII. Blood brings the dragon to the pit. And we're not just talking about Daenerys, but Drogon as well. Damn, you know it's getting close to the end of the book when you have the dragon pit scene. Yeah, damn, where are we? We're here at Jon XI, where the overview is,

Jon treats with torment, allowing 4,000 free folk to pass the Wall in exchange for a healthy number of hostages to Castle Black. The men of the Watch aren't happy with Jon's decision, and the winds of winter blow even harder. He was not a tall man, Tormund Giant's Bane, but the gods had given him a broad chest and massive belly. Mance Rayder had named him Tormund Hornblower for the power of his lungs, and was wont to say that Tormund could laugh the snow off mountaintops. In his wrath, his bellows reminded John of a mammoth trumpeting. That day, Tormund bellowed often and loudly. So, this hornblower thing is interesting. Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts about this.

Our good friend Elena, actually, the bear heir on Twitter, Daisy Mormont, if you've seen her round, she also was a small council member over at Ice and Fire Con, which you guys should come hang out with us at if Eliana's not busy sleeping during it. I do a lot of napping. There's a lot of people that I miss out on meeting because I was, I don't know, napping

somewhere. Every time they're like, Chloe, where's Eliana? And I'm like, I don't know, asleep. I don't know. It's like a weekend. Of course I'm napping somewhere every time they're like chloe where's aliana and i'm like i don't know asleep i don't know it's a it's like a weekend of course i'm napping it's a holiday it's a holiday weekend it's a vacation you're supposed to relax so elena has talked a lot about torment and the horn of jorman and she talks about the book of joshua how on the seventh day of the battle of jericho the priests walked around the walls seven times and blew their horns to bring the walls down and slaughtered every living creature inside other than Rahab, who helped their spies survive. While we may have seen a horn that's

magical, burnt along with rattleshirt in place of Mance Rayder, Torben swears up and down it wasn't the horn of winter and that it's out there still. A lot of people theorize Euron's horn is a dragon horn that he found in Old Valyria, or is it the horn to bring the wall down? She doesn't subscribe to that theory. She thinks it's hidden somewhere in the north, and I agree with that. I think it might even be at Hardhome, since Tormund is going to Hardhome. But since the wall's already coming down, Tormund probably is going to do it. And not for bad, right? It's going to be because he's leading the Free Folk as king beyond the wall, helping the Stark King, Jon Snow, bring down the others to save Westeros from another long night, just like the stories go with Joramun.

And I think there's a lot in the books that can support this theory. I mean, Tormund himself literally resembles a rune-laden horn from the very first time we meet him to the chapter we're reading. There's the line in Jon 1 in A Storm of Swords, thick gold bands graven with runes bound his massive arms, and he wore a heavy shirt of black ringmail that could have only come from a dead ranger. And of course, in this chapter, we see the armbands again, solid gold, heavy, engraved with first men ancient runes. Tormund had worn them as long as Jon had known him, and they seemed as much a part of him as his beard. So I think it's very interesting that his body is shaped almost

literally the way the horn is described, right? Like thick, like an aurochs with gold runes laden on the horn, like torment and there are other echoes of this plot right uh in john 2 in a storm of swords he wonders if mance had given torment thunder fist the horn to blow uh he in bran for a storm of swords we learn from the stories that bran has learned from as a child that he brought her back to the Nightfort and proclaimed her a queen and himself her king. And with strange sorceries, he bound his brothers to his will. For 13 years, they ruled, knights, king, and his corpse queen, till finally the Stark of Winterfell and Joramun of the Wildlings had joined to free the Watch from bondage. And next chapter, we get

a line where Jon is thinking of Jormund blowing the horn of winter and waking giants from the earth. And then he wonders, is Tormund lying to him? Or was Mance lying to him then? If Mance's horn was just a feint, where is the true horn? I mean, Tormund's name is literally Hornblower from Mance, right? I think it's safe to say there's a giant flashing arrow saying Tormund going at us right now. But how does it happen, right? Maybe it's crisis mode when the others are attacking. I just, I don't see him obviously doing it for funsies. And I don't see him betraying Jon at this point.

No, he doesn't seem like he's going to betray Jon. I think, so something that I'm thinking right now is like, you know how we aren't necessarily convinced that all the prophecies of like Azor Ahai, the prince that was promised and all those are necessarily like the same person. Maybe they are, maybe they're not, or maybe we'll never know. Like, I mean, there's the whole thing, right? Of the horn that wakes the sleepers. We have like a dragon binder horn. And maybe there are just like a bunch of different horns like it could be that

torment in this role of jormund right maybe there's a horn that wakes the sleepers because i do still think that there's significance behind sam right of horn hill and the history of their family and him having that small nondescript horn being of some sort of significance you know i can see that yeah it's like a bunch of different horns but i think that like there there's definitely something of what you're saying of an echo of like jorman and you know a lord commander slash stark right it's just doing something reuniting again to what extent is it is really the question yeah and for what there's definitely something turn down for what the joramun story i mean their names sound like each other like it's just a

little too close for comfort here yeah but I mean George also does like making names that sound the same and yeah for fun are literally the same yeah he does like to do it for fun to give a sense of realism or whatever to his story

right right anyway so Torment does show up to the wall he downs his drinking horn different horn. He throws it at John. Yells at John. Who hasn't done this before to their friends? You know, sprays him with mead from his mouth, calls him a lying craven.

Finally, hours later, they are on talking terms. This is true friendship. I know, like, who hasn't thrown? Ideally an empty cup right I mean everyone wants to throw things at John too let's be real that's true and I think it's such a great contrast to see their relationship

between like the one that John has with his quote unquote brothers here at the wall who are like kind of polite to his face for the most part somewhat they're somewhat civil but they're stabbing him in the back literally whereas here you know Tormund's just like insulting him and telling him how he fucking sucks right to his face and I think it also helps to show us that despite the Night's Watch thinking that Jon is like fully wildling and only has loyalty to them well turns out the wildlings don't quite forgive Jon for

everything either they're like well a shit ton of our people died because you betrayed us yeah absolutely tormund shakes hands with john he asks the gods to forgive him because there are a hundred mothers who never will john repeats the words of his vows in his head i am the sword in the darkness i'm the watcher on the walls i am the fire that burns against the cold the light that brings the dawn the horn that wakes the sleepers the shield that guards the realms of men and for him a new refrain i am the god who opened the gates and let the foe march through so this this isn't the first time we're going to hear the oath in this very chapter, which I guess kind of gives it a sense of continuity. But here's a wild thought about Jon being the guard who opened the gates.

The person who came to mind for me in this moment is Maester Pycelle opening the gates for Tywin. Ah, I wouldn't have actually thought of that at first, but it's kind of fitting. I like that. I don't know that it goes poorly for Jon, right? It's probably not going to go poorly in the way that it did for Maester Pycelle in King's Landing, right?

Not this time. Yeah, George is showing different ways that like the different circumstances can change it but like i mean they must have been thinking the same thing like the impetus behind it is obviously the same like i trust this person and i think that what they're doing is right or i i am stuck in my convictions because obviously maester pie cell for reasons that i still don't fully understand like i kind of get it i kind of get it but also at the same time i'm like no you're wrong i get it but I kind of get it, but also at the same time, I'm like, no, you're wrong. I get it, but you're wrong, Maester Pycelle.

Why he would be like, I believe in Tywin's vision. It's a wrong vision, but... Right, like this time it's the exact opposite problem that Jon actually has the right idea and no one agrees. Actually, that's true. Literally no one agrees. Literally no one agrees. Just like no one would probably agree about opening the gates for tywin to be fair that's true maester paisel what is wrong with you that's true well i mean eris was like you know what sure kind of whatever

anyways john worries that he isn't doing the right thing. Maester Pycelle, did he worry about that? Debato, probably not. Jon knows that they're past the point of return, though. Tormund is skinnier and older than the last time Jon saw him. And Tormund also says that, you know what? Man should have killed you when he could have. Yep. And asks what happened to the sweet boy that he knew.

And Jon tells him, well, they made him Lord Commander. asks what happened to the sweet boy that he knew and john tells him well they made him lord commander this is interesting because it's been what like one to two years tops a year since they've seen each other and less less than that even less than that and tormund looks older than the last time john saw him i mean he is obviously but like we're all very much so older like he notices deeper crow's feet on his face. Talk about weathering, right? They're running from the others, fighting, drinking to stay warm, like, 20 hours a day, right? And to dull the pain and to enjoy their miserable lives right now, running from the others. Kind of shitty, especially when we learn about the trauma that Tormund's undergone in this

time. Yeah. Really shitty. And like I said, Jon's not just a little emo boy in love with Yrith anymore. He's a grown man. He's a commander. He's parlaying. He meets enemies in the field. He's leading. Definitely a big show of it here.

Yeah. And I mean, I can see how... I wonder if this was supposed to be slated for what? Like after a five-year gap? Or if this was going to be like a flashback on it when George had that. Because it obviously makes sense for someone to be like, you don't look like a little boy anymore five years later, right? Or for a tournament to look drastically changed. But I mean, it works here too, because as you said, you can really see how that battle's taking its toll. They discuss how their people will feel betrayed from this deal.

And Tormund pulls his solid gold armbands off and gives them to Jon as a first payment, passed down from his grandfather and father. Jon immediately feels guilty and says, maybe should keep a man because taiko's just gonna melt him down but tormund says no he doesn't want it said that he did not do his part to forge a new life for his people yeah it's a good show of leadership on tormund's part that he would be the first one to give up his riches if he would ask the same of those who are following him yeah a lot of ned's lessons that we see Jon demonstrate in text tend to be echoed when it comes to some of these free folk leaders, like

Tormund or like Mance, and I think that's why Jon obviously respects them, because they do what they think is right, even if Jon doesn't always agree, they do what they think is right to protect their people. But Tormund does say he wants to keep his cock ring, which is much

bigger than his armbands so I think he got away you know for this one all right yeah he's in this way you know he's very different from dead right he Tormund jokes Tormund talks about his trauma openly very openly and yeah it is it's great how he slips into it right it's a nice character moment because john says to torment i you haven't changed and torrent's like actually john i really have i've seen a lot of death things kind of suck and um oh my son's died dormant was cut down in the battle for the wall and him still half a boy. What are your king's knights did for him? Some bastard all in grey steel with moths

upon his shield. I saw the cut, but my boy was dead before I reached him. And Torwind! It was the cold claimed him. Always sickly, that one. He just up and died one night. The worst of it, before we ever knew he'd died.

He rose, pale, with them blue eyes. Had to see him myself. That was hard, John. Tears shone in his eyes. He wasn't much of a man truth be told but he'd been a little boy once and I loved him

mmmm torment hard yep sucks it's hard man and we're seeing the other side here with all this right like just as the knights

watch and the northmen have been telling john over and over and over again in the past few chapters like we lost people the wildlings killed our friends well guess what turns out as we all know and have been discussing the previous chapters it It's the same for the Free Folk. Also, throwing it out there, it was Richard Horpe who killed Tormund's son. We know this because of the Grey Steel and the mods upon his shield. Fuck that guy. He's not great. Just saying.

There's some interesting, I think there's something interesting going on with Richard Thorpe for, like, the story, right? But he sucks. Not interesting enough to me fuck him but I do think it's interesting just putting this out here Tormund had to kill someone that he loved with his entire existence because they turned inhumane hmm just gonna put that on the table real soft anyways you know I know that it's still up in the air, right? Now that, like, things have been released and people are questioning it again, whether or not Jon will be the one who stabs in the areas. But in the show, they had Tyrion kind of goading Jon. It would be interesting if it were Tormund instead.

Hmm. I could see that. In that role? I mean, I think Tormund's definitely gonna have a bigger role as far as what he does in the Free Folk. I mean, they gave him pretty much the role probably in the show that works, but I could say that we're gonna see a lot more of it in the books. Yeah.

Well, Tormund still has two sons alive, though, and his daughter Munda lives as well. She was actually married off to Longspear Rick. Tormund still has two sons alive, though, and his daughter Munda lives as well. She was actually married off to Longspear Rick. Tormund threatened to rip off Rick's cock and beat him with it if he didn't treat Munda well. And Tormund is basically the dad with the gun. That's what this is. He would be sitting there like, nah, you're going to take my daughter out, are you?

That's who Tormund is. Yeah like that's who torment is yeah that's who tormond's being right now absolutely yeah torment says that it's time john got back to his men and john makes it business first he repeats their deal logistics dawn three days from now the boys first torment Tormund is like, Irel will be there and the mammoths will be sure to take the long way around. Yeah. There's a line here that Tormund says, he's like, I'll make sure there's no fighting

they're rushing at your bloody gate. Nice and orderly will be ducklings in a row and me, the mother duck. First of all, I think George had a thing for ducks going on in dance. It should have been really called a dance for duck gods, or maybe a duck for dragons. Unsure.

Ooh, duck on Tarly? Ooh, duck on Tarly. That's a good idea. Someone should make that. Between this and the rolly duck field stuff, right? But also, as you said, duck on Tarly. Coincidence? I think not.

Quack, quack. Second, Tormund promises no damage. right but also as you said duck on tarly coincidence i think not quack quack second torment promises no damage i didn't think it was that funny i'm just laughing because you thought it was funny i thought it was horrible i love it i know second torment promises no damage to this as he says bloody gate and i just want to remind everyone that there is in fact a bloody gate in this story that's formally named as such and it is in the veil yeah and there's also the whole like come in my bloody gate wait a second fuck come in my gate i don't know come into my castle so yes there is there is a bloody gate good reminder and there is a lot we're going to come to this in a minute but there is a lot of mountain imagery kind of around torment so i find

that interesting i really do so torment says that if john warns his east watch men they are friend and not foe his men won't accidentally attack the knight's watchmen. I thought that was very interesting. Mm-hmm. Interesting reversal there. Yeah. And then there's this beautiful, beautiful exposition passage. The sun had returned to the sky after a fortnight's absence, and to the south the wall rose blue-white and glittering.

There was a saying John had heard from the older men in Castle Black. The wall has more moods than Mad King Aerys, they'd say. Or sometimes, the wall has more moods than a woman. On cloudy days, it looked to be white rock. On moonless nights, it was as black as coal. In snowstorms, it seemed carved of snow. But on days like this, there was no mistaking it for anything but ice on days like this the wall shimmered bright as a septon's crystal every crack and crevasse

limbed by sunlight as frozen rainbows danced and died behind translucent ripples on days like this the wall was beautiful you know i think maybe it's just because I was getting really normalized with Pullman's kind of brief imagery from our His Dark Materials readings, but there's something about a good

GRRM porno, like, the wall is shimmering beautiful as a septum's crystal. Like, that to me, that is some porn. Like, y'all got porn hub i got george rr martin describing the wall your bloody gate these are not the same things so how clever do you think george felt when he sat there and he wrote and to the south the wall rose blue yeah i think that's a good catch that's a thing as soon as i read the wall rose blue i was like all right george you can't put blue and rose

in a sentence not purposefully um i was looking at like the other things and other descriptions of the wall in this chapter where they keep talking about it being like black with like some of the cracks looked red or something but i talking about it being like black with like some of the cracks looked red or something but I think that this what you're saying like that one definitely something there the end of the chapter they talk about that I know what you're talking about okay

and that to me is almost very much so like fire and bloodish foreshadowing right yeah the black to red, very much so. I think George is definitely digging into some symbolism here. He talks about, or it's said in this passage, the wall has more moods than Mad King Ares.

It's really crazy that right now, as you read this, Dany and Jon don't even know about the other. Like, they don't care, don't know, but there's hints of them littered all over these chapters when you dig for it when they do meet i can't believe i'm saying this out loud you're gonna be like what i think we're all gonna be pleasantly like taken by this writing i think it's gonna be like slipping on your favorite slippers it's gonna be easy a nice pair of yoga pants you know that's how it's gonna feel it's

just gonna flow it's gonna be so easy and seamless like i mean these chapters right here have pretty much secured it by the time he comes back she'll have gone through a bunch more shit and burned a bunch of shit but they'll be lonely gods and they'll be like hello i love you and um oh why did you make that noise? I don't know what's happened to me, honestly. I really don't know what's gotten into me. But there's just so much of them littered everywhere right now. And also, silly colloquialisms. Like, more moods than a woman, huh?

Of course. The closed-minded racist sexist region says these things. Ugh. So annoying. minded racist sexist region says these things uh so annoying and i i do think that that's there because it's very telling of how the realm is going to perceive daenerys yeah the realm who is not john who's going to go as you said well um i stand by the idea that she's not going to go mad but will be perceived as such by oh yeah you, the way that Varys and others have been twisting the narrative there quite unfairly. And because of the sexism in Westeros, right? As you pointed out, it's not a coincidence that the two of being mad as Ares and morbids and a woman or whatever are being equated here. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

And it's silly to call it madness in my opinion especially when george just put out what fire and blood that details a bunch of shit that we did not know before from like the princess and the queen expanding on and adding more sides adding more feelings and opinions like was raniera mad no did she make decisions that were very much so based on her isolation and loss in the end that may have been poor decisions? Yes, absolutely. Ares didn't overnight succumb to being mad, right? Like it's very obvious why he was the way he was. He was traumatized and tortured and isolated and he turned off, like he turned away from from everyone i think calling it going mad is kind of simplifying it especially when we know that daenerys has to hit like volantis she has

to deal with pentos likely has to deal with karth as you and i talk about um yeah and marine uh who knows what's gonna happen there with shave paintave Paint Littlefinger just hanging around. And then she has to come home and find out like all these traitors in her realm, including young Griff. There's a lot we're missing in the TV show, mad Danny shit that obviously we're going to see in the books. It's going to change her. That feeling of loss. The closest thing in season eight that could have come anywhere near

that anchor is probably the missandei loss for me that was like oh holy shit i would burn shit if missandei died i could see that happening but there's so much more to fill that space with that there's no way to like call it madness when you have a whole book and a half of danny just getting just dog fucked by life you know yeah they're just like mad not mad yeah normal ass mad like she just needs like a take five or a snickers oh my god okay i do really like those snickers commercials i'm not gonna lie i don't know why they're so dumb they're so dumb so then we have Toreg Tormund's taller and eldest son which is fascinating because turns out Tormund's actually not as tall as I would think

he is right in the books they portray him as a lot taller he feels he's got tall energy but apparently Toreg's real tall he speaks with near the horses. Horse, not an actual horse, I want to clarify this, is nearby as well, back to them. And these are the two men that John brought with him to this parley. It's a big mistake that John only brought horse and leathers. He might not realize it. In his head, he obviously thought he needs to bring people that will be okay with Tormund, people that won't threaten Tormund, people he can trust around the Free Folk to, you know, chill and let him take the lead.

But more men would have been threatening to bring more than two men. But he brought a boy from Molestown and he brought Leathers who leathers is more northern than any guy at the wall john left the faction of boomers at the wall and you know that's like the worst thing to do they crave attention like bowen othell selador like that is their shit give them attention john's not playing by the rules of these old outdated politics a lot like Ned Stark in the first book and John's gonna die for it a lot like Ned Stark in the first book yeah

that is what happens in the first book in fact yep and John doesn't think about any of this unwarranted protection because he's like whatever I also brought Ghost. And he calls to him.

And at the same time mounting his horse, the raven flies to his saddle, screaming about Khorne. Turns out the raven has also followed him. Because... Oh, that's his home. John, yes. John, his favorite tree. The raven's favorite tree. Ghost hasn't arrived yet at John's beckon call but wait

here he comes with val every boy on the internet their heart just broke because val is killing it right now with this outfit game her and ghosts were out there taking selfies in the woods they were putting their pictures on with the amparo filter uh the nashville the help me out here are there any other ones uh the i don't actually know the names of all the there's like a moon filter right which is just black and white i don't know what these are all called yeah the twitter one is stark i like that but val is wearing white woolen breeches with white bleach leather boots and a white bearskin cloak eoric no with a weirwood face pinning it to her shoulder her eyes are blue and her hair is the color of honey and her cheeks are pink from the snow john's like i have a boner

you know she's not as blonde as i thought, in retrospect. It also is worth noting, you know, like, as you said, John, hard AF right now. But, like, John loved Ygritte so much. Because, like, we don't really talk about Val's appearance that much in Storm. He's like, yeah, she's cute. But, like, the entirety of, like, Storm. Not the entirety of Storm, but, like, they're in each other's presence quite a bit. They scale an entire wall together.

But he's only really noticing her now. He's like, wait. I see you. I mean, I think he was a little depressed to notice that before. You know? Well, he was, A, really into Ygritte. Then later on, yes, he was depressed. But now he's like, I'm sad and depressed, but also horny now.

I mean, he's 16. Yeah. He does flirt back with her. And, you know, she looks like Queen Alysanne. That's who she looks like with her coloring. So obviously Val is supposed to be this bridge to Daenerys for us, right? Like blonde and fiery in attitude. with her coloring so obviously val is supposed to be this bridge to daenerys for us right like blonde and fiery in attitude but she looks like queen ali here with the blue eyes and the honey colored hair

and her cheeks all pink from snow that's uh very much so what i think of the cheeks pink i don't think this is something george is referencing but i always think of the line or the moment in Pride and Prejudice when Elizabeth has what traipsed across like the entirety of whatever to show up at like Darcy's door because she's like asking about something he's like wow she looks so great she's so in camp but look at all the blood and color in her cheeks or whatever well that's like a that's a common thing in a lot of pieces I mean you got like a lot of old youth fiction books girls pinching their cheeks for color in them rouges you know blushes that's true that's true i do like blush yeah for sure so john's flirting he's like you try to steal my dog and

she's like yup but i'm gonna step on you too that was pretty much verbatim what she says and torman laughs and he's like Val is far too good for you, and you better get stealing soon if you want her. Jon's like, in his head, he's thinking about what Axel said about her, that Val is nubile, she's pretty, good hips and breasts. And Jon's like, yeah, she does. She does have those things, but also she's more than that she's more than just a birthing factory because you know men are really deep and a man wrote these yeah oh absolutely

absolutely a man wrote this chapter she found torment where seasoned rangers would have failed she'd be a great wife for any lord he thinks but he he already sowed her fate by denying her marriage to him he tells Tormund that Torag could have her he swore a vow unfortunately but Tormund says Val wouldn't mind him breaking his vows and Val's like yeah uh come try yeah and then pats her bone knife she's like lord crow is welcome to steal to my bed and he knows he dares once he's been gelded keeping those vows will come much easier for him oh my god vows on fire for sure in this episode yeah interestingly you know val flirtatious not as keen on john as we thought uh not in front of other people, Eliana. Come on now.

Yeah, nothing turns guys on like threatening to castrate them. That's what I've learned. It's true. Also, I just want to point out, Lord Crow. Great pun name. Very much props. Rhymes with snow. Amazing. So many meanings.

Yes. Truly, truly a princess. a pun princess. No, not as good as I thought it was going to be. Do you think when John and Danny get together, it'll be pun-cest all the time on this podcast? I think it really will be. And you know, she's got great singers too. Gonna throw it out there.

And I think that's really what's going to win John over. Yeah, he is attracted to that intelligence i mean and free thinkers you know he was out there like eager i know you're voting third party this election but val asks how monster is and what her sleeping arrangements are and john's like well queen celise is here and you're going to have to stay in Hardin's Tower now. Has a little less space, but you know, no queen. And she says she'd choose freedom over comfort any day. But he warns her, you're still a captive. It's my men, though, that are guarding you, not Selyse's.

Yes, John's very trustworthy men. Compassionate, really a touching sort of man. If I had to take a stab stab i'd say that his friends are going to be closer than ever to him soon oh my gosh truly truly they are and they're going to get under his skin and also these comments about choosing freedom over comfort from val i just think it's an interesting running theme throughout A Dance with Dragons. It connects well with some of Tyrion's own thoughts and musings about being a slave of

Yezen Zokagas. I don't know who's right. You know, like, at least if you're alive you have a chance at freedom, but that's a choice that at least... The fact is they're saying that that's a choice, I guess.

It's open to people, right? Yeah. And I guess for some people it's not a choice. Yeah, so it's kind of like survive. You know what I mean? Yeah. Until like trying to make it because... Yeah.

Anyways. The removal of that choice is abhorrent. And I think that's a big part of what george's books are saying yeah i mean at the very end of the day we have a broad look at how the series is going to end i think anyone that is reading these books in a critical manner or trying to you know do some comprehensive checkups on what they think of the story can kind of assume like this is a broad theme running through the story freedom over comfort sometimes comfort is bad and sometimes you have to break some eggs to make an omelet a freedom omelet what by making an omelet out of eagle eggs anyways so val and john are walking and john's like by the way one

one is sleeping in the entry hall and it's really cute because val's like dala couldn't even boast of that is this is this sisterly competition does anyone with a sister want to weigh in here because we don't know but yeah what is it like i don't know even from the dead sisterly competition yeah i mean that must exist like we see it in stannis right he's all like runley true must be must be a thing john watches the faces peering out of tents they walk through the camp there's free folk young and old ratio of like one to three to four men to women to children all of them are gaunt and skinny things and he thinks that this is no victory march when man sled the free folk it was to glory but now there are no

animals everyone is starving the snuffleupaga with them would have been slaughtered if it were not for the last giants he sees sickness in the camps too which just quiets him and he wonders if the thousands of free folk mother mole has in hard home are also sick this really stuck out to me this read through especially with what val is going to talk about later about shireen and the pale mare flaring up in other chapters in a dance with dragons and of course you have fire and blood and you have many diseases talked about there like the shivers. There's a line in Fire and Blood. And then the shivers

came and the stranger walked the land. Disease has hit Westeros many times and shivers has hit it a few times. Last during Jake and Allie's reign in 59 AC after a particularly bad wave of famine in a harsh

winter. It starts with a chill and it gets so bad that the person that has it, their teeth are chattering and they're convulsing and by the end their lips turn blue and the victim begins to cough up blood. Yeah, it doesn't sound good. Not good, guys.

Daenerys, Jaehaerys and Alysanne's daughter died of this. And a lot of people took that to mean in the book that Daenerys would maybe die in the north. But I think it could be applied to the Free Folk here very easily, especially when you consider some of the dynamics during the Shivers outbreak and King's Landing, for example, and how they can be applied and remixed at the wall, since George does a lot of that sandbox story play, right?

The Lord Commander of the City Watch at the time, Carl Corbray, dies of the shivers, and then some of his men die as well. It results in chaos in the city, and their master of coin, Lord Rago Draz, is murdered in the streets by starving people because, you know, killed rich. But this shit killed everyone. It wiped out like half the small council, a bunch of the great lords, a quarter of the reach, a third of the citadel's maesters. I could see this hitting in the north and it already has, right? We have some really dark things like cannibalism going on. The pale mare is running rampant through a dance with dragons i mean it's it's definitely going to be explored yeah i mean it definitely absolutely is like it's something that george has been heavily

hinting at along with that idea of right starvation and the other internal conflict i it's gonna come up in a big way i think in wins and in dream the show hand waved it away grayscale it's just like mentioned too many times to show up and as you said there's the shivers we have and you also mentioned like the pale mare and i think you know the fact of the matter is this is something that happens in real life and george is probably taking inspiration from that like in places of conflict like you this is a big part of why ebola was able to like become such an outbreak amongst many other reasons right like ebola being highly contagious etc in places like the democratic republic of congo right there are places where there's like a bazillion different militias just roaming around

scarce resources and people who are isolated from those other resources it makes it hard to get treatment and easy for disease to spread right like people are already kind of not in the healthiest form they can be and then you have the addition of like not everyone's aware that an epidemic is going on and then there's more fighting. It's like a whole cycle. And then here in this world that George has created, you also have magic ice zombies and ice demons. And it's all just going to like... Like you thought you were stressed before. Yeah, it's all going to like come together.

And I think he's exploring how some of these, you know, treating the others, right, is just like another one of these many things with the added stressors of this is what human conflict looks like. Yeah, absolutely. So John, John thinks that Cotter Pike may be close to Eastwatch now with free folk aboard the ships. John's wrong, as we know, but he doesn't know that yet. And he turns back to Val, who asks how his talk with Tormund went. Ask me a year from now. The hard part still awaits me. The part where I convince mine own to eat this meal I've cooked for them.

None of them are going to like the taste, I fear. You know, the beginning of that reminded me of the line from the show from Tyrion and Jon's conversation on doing the right thing. When Tyrion says, ask me again in 10 years. I don't know what stuck out. Yes. I also thought that was interesting. Maybe they got inspiration from this, but that's also like assuming that they read.

I'll tell you, they have read the books. It's not that they haven't read them. It's just they don't understand them. Dude, they didn't know that sam was a pov i'm never gonna let it go another line that i was reminded of was this one in the clash of kings uh brand four where drojan has this prophecy that he tells Bran of, you were sitting at supper, but instead of a servant, Maester Luwin brought you your food. He served you the king's cut of the roast, the meat rare and bloody,

but with a savory smell that made everyone's mouth water. The meat he served, the phrase was old and gray and dead. Yet they liked their supper better than you liked yours. And here in both, this part of like the meal that's cooked, the meal that's being served means news so i i think it's just kind of interesting the way that that metaphor is carried through in both bran and john's chapters but also speaking of brand chapters in clash chloe recently did a thing yeah you know i just did uh the Harvest Feast over at Not A Cast Podcast.

It was a blast. We had a feast ourselves. It was not the king's cut of the roast, per se. But, you know. Oh, yes. Pretty good. Did you notice that? Yeah.

That Bran was served the king's cut of the roast. I'm just putting that out there. Yeah. That's relevant and it's interesting the way that's framed because obviously brand's news that he gets is bad news right and the frays are happy about their news about their gross dead news uh but he's unhappy about his but that's the king's news he was brought news that as future ruler, he was supposed to handle. Interesting.

Yeah. And also, like, it's the same thing here, right? Where the news that he got was theoretically good, but he doesn't like the taste of it. And I think that's kind of the same for the Night's Watchmen here, too. But they can't, their palates are not accustomed to this meal that Jon has prepared for them. Because I'm going to be real. Jon's doing some good work here, you know? This is theoretically should be considered good news. I can see, we see later on why they don't think it is.

And they quite do not like the taste of this meal. I mean, it's good news that it passed the House, but it's never going to pass the Senate, Eliana. It sure isn't they're gonna veto john's life well they don't veto they're good they have a really intense impeachment process it's called death it's called impeach john snow that's actually oh my god i want that as a shirt i I also have something. I have something really crazy to say. Oh yes.

Stannis, I will go to my grave thinking of my brother's impeach. So Val wants to help out the Watchmen more, and Jon thinks this could be a great alliance. Everyone already thinks she's a princess. But he corrects those thoughts. Everyone already thinks she's a princess. But he corrects those thoughts. He's like a warrior princess, he decided. Not some willowy creature who sits up in a tower brushing her hair, waiting for some knight to rescue her.

Shut the fuck up, John. Or shut the fuck up, George. I don't know. I don't know. Probably John. Silly. It's like... Silly. I think it's supposed to be

shut the fuck up, Jon, because George is like, let's explore a bazillion different princesses and towers. Jonza is cancelled, you guys. It's cancelled. Get over it. It actually kind of is cancelled. Kind of, yeah. Right? I mean, I don't know. God, this is not the time, Eliana.

No, I mean, we don't know what their POVs think, right? I think there's going to be some weird, confused feelings. Doesn't necessarily mean there will be, like, John's a confirmed action, but I think they're going to have some weird feelings about each other. I mean, they're both attractive young people. Let's be real. With weird resentments build up.

Everyone's going to have weird feelings towards everyone. Let's never forget the 1993 letter. My god. But I mean, it's not as weird as boning your aunt. I think that's the weirdest most confused feeling you can feel.

John has a lot of confused boners. He's having some right here. Anyways, John says he'll speak with Selyise about it and that and that val is welcome to come if she feels up to kneeling and then val wants to laugh at selise if you know she does end up kneeling and john says no you you really can't do that that would deeply offend them they're very thin-skinned and you know they're actually the only ones who are okay with this plan of letting the free folk in the realm. Please do not fuck this up for me. Yeah, she's like, I'll play the part for your

queen. And John thinks in this moment, Solis is not his queen. Interesting thought. They ride in silence with Ghost and the Raven following, and they arrive to Men in Black waiting to hear how the peace talk went. John tells his brothers that the Free Folk will pass through the wall as friends, some as brothers as well. He knows he must see the Queen immediately or she'd think it were a slight against her, so he plans to come back and write letters afterward. He says he'll need to summon the Boomers, too, Marsh, Yarwick, Salador, and Clytus. Flint and Nori will also be invited to the shindig atop the

wall at sunset. He and Val go on to meet the queen, and Val makes fun of the queen more, saying she has heard that Selyse has a beard. Because, you know, women have fucking facial hair, Val. It's 300 AC. Anyways. Um, this might be, like, my one critique of the chapter, is that

George is spending so much time painting S Solis as ugly by being like physically she's ugly she has a mustache and she's just an ugly mean woman and it's like we get it she's very ugly on the inside right like I get that she's very mean her actions are not nice she's kind of a bitch right like you don't want to hang out with Solis it doesn't sound fun it's not for me she's like literally angela from the office we talk about in my household but uh she she's just a very uptight and mean and uh grew up under all these southern courtesies and lessons and way to act and you don't need to just outright highlight like, oh, she has mustache hair. She has a beard.

She has this. Later, there's this line that, you know, Val says about Solis that Solis has more hair on her face than I do between my legs. Like, it might be a critique of the chapter that George, there's definitely a lot more that Val could hate about Solis. I don't think Val would give a shit about what Solis looks like. And I noticed this over Christmas with some family members that like, everyone has to be pretty. Like, oh, I don't like her. I don't think she's very pretty. Why does it fucking matter? You're not going to sleep with her. Like, it doesn't matter what Solis looks like. I don't

know. It's a big critique of that character in general that she serves as a bad consolation prize to Stannis.'s selise's role even though here in these very scenes she's getting her own characterization she's very much so this accessory to stannis's failure as the middle child who doesn't get the pretty wife like robert and renly and i think that's a bummer because she could be more complex as a kind of villainous queen in here that she's, you know, against forging these new alliances. Yeah, and I think it's fine for her to be characterized as ugly on the inside and the outside. But as you were saying, like, as you were saying, like, it's weird that this is the only thing that Val is harping on. There's so much more.

It's body hair. You're telling me that a wildling, free folk, spear wife, badass can hold her own would say shit about someone's body hair you're telling me that a wildling free folk spear wife badass can hold her own would say shit about someone's body hair really george come on now dude you're such a dude also there's no fucking way that uh val has less hair in her vag than celise has on her face. Like, I'm just, like, that's not how that grows. It's really not. And also just, like, I mean, I assume that there are quite a few, maybe, like, hairy women among the free folk and the wildlings. Like, this seems like it would be a great boon. You're going to be fucking cold.

Yeah. Yeah. I have my legs nice and hairy right now for winter. Like, what the fuck? It's a medieval fantasy, though. Yeah. I mean, like, I think it's more likely, if anything, she would be critiquing Selyse for what? Sitting, for her demeanor, for being weak, even.

I think it would be even more- Yeah, for sewing. It would be, well, not sewing it would be well not sewing because sewing is actually probably a valuable skill in terms of making clothing but like i would i could see her critiquing solis absolutely for for being weak like that seems like something that would make sense culturally right that she couldn't even hold a spear it's just maybe she even makes maybe she even makes a joke right maybe there's a sex joke there of Spears and Stannis I don't know and that would be more

make more sense to me than the constant harping on Selyse's facial hair yeah I just feel like there could be other traits to harp on like the fact that Selyse is trying to force Val to marry people all the time or you know like this that and the other thing there's like a lot to work with so

I don't know my one critique there that's my uh my negative for the day for the chapter but yeah john jokes along about it anyways so john's also on my shit list i guess oh yeah and i mean like so he's trying to marry people off that's like what she thinks a queen is supposed to do right she's trying it is it is what, right? She's trying. Well, and it is what queens do, but it's like, read the room. No, you're not good. That's the point. Read the room. And I mean, the fact of the matter is,

Stannis and Slyce don't have good options or connections. They're at the wall. That's where they are right now to try to make their stand for why Stannis should be king. It's not the best place to start, right? Yeah, their now kiss moments are like worse than like everyone else's arranged marriages they're like i don't know these these are two people this shitty seventh cousin that we have somehow in our party you can marry him and get

nothing like yeah and that's why they're there they're there because there's empty castles that they can have um and like we've talked about, it's very much so just like when Cregan went south and the Riverlands, you know, were very desperate and needed to be resettled. There's a lot of that, but I don't know. There's just a lot that can be gleaned from this, but Selyse is still very much

so at Castle Black. She has not really been hasty in moving to the Nightfort. We're getting there. We're working at it. They approach her guarded tower with four men at the door, two inside and two in the steps. Patrick of King's Mountain leads and greets them, dropping to one knee,

kissing Val's hand and telling her, Solis has spoken of your beauty. And Val's like, that's funny because I've literally never met this chick ever. Yeah, it's pretty funny. And then as Patrick's on the ground, then Val goes,

Up with you now, Sir Kneeler. Up, up. She sounded as if she were talking to a dog. It was all that John could do not to laugh. This is truly comedy. Thank you, George. Yeah, this is actually one of the better moments in this chapter. Yeah.

It goes to show that as much as the night's watch looks down on wildlings and free folk clearly they look down on them too they're like y'all are dogs and the knights look down on them ghost makes salise nervous what is it with all these random ass queens like being nervous around dogs all right i know i don't know so he leaves ghosts outside as they head in salise is sewing by the fire and patch faces dancing around singing i guess they're not dogs they're wolves whatever the crow the crow under the sea the crows are white as snow i know I know, I know. Oh, oh, oh. I didn't come up with a tune for that. I'm sorry, everyone.

It's okay. You could try again later if you want. I don't really care. Basically, Patchface here. He's like saying, you know, they're going to be whites. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, it has like a double meaning too, right? I'm sure it's referring to John in some stupid manner, but very much so and shireen is curled up in the corner she's got her hoodie up you know how preteens are uh melisandre's not around john and val kneel to celise and he presents val

telling her she was sister to dala celise cuts him off and decides to shit on dallas memory saying that oh yeah the chick that gave us this noisy-ass baby. She says it's a good thing they got Val back before Stannis came home. Shireen asks if Val is the Wildling Princess, and Val's like, yes, my sister was Dalla, who was married to King Beyond the Wall Mance. Yeah, Shireen is super pumped that there's another princess, because she's an only child and, like us, can't really relate to having a dead sister.

Slyze interrupts her as she's talking about her cousin Edric and says that the Lord Commander doesn't want to hear of Robert's byblows. Fucking finally, it's taken five books for someone to shut their fucking mouth about bastards in front of john i'm just putting it out there this is like the very first time where someone's like oh we don't talk about bastards in front of this boy it would anger him uh it is smart cool courtesy right calculating john's a bastard likely celise thinks i don't want to say anything about bastards in front of him but also Solis has pride for her king Edric is literally the by-blow product of

the shame of their marriage bed and also shame to Solis who has not provided Stannis with an heir all of this obviously is subtext I am now adding to this story to give to you guys since George refuses to write Solis yeah and I do

think that John would have appreciated at least maybe Shireen being like, I don't know, I really like Dedrick. Right? Yeah, I mean, all the kids affectionately speaking, like, they all call him a bastard and say, like, oh, that's my bastard brother John. Like, they don't think any

different of it. It's just the way these kids were raised. They're innocent well because partially i don't know if shireen's been like taught what it means necessarily either like in the way aria wasn't earlier for them they're saying yeah he's my bastard brother in the way they're like same way he's a brunette wait did you say the seed is strong um i didn't mean to but i'm just saying it really fucking is she sends shireen off with patch face who sings come with me beneath the sea away away away thank you i think that was really a good effort thank you thank you so the usual prophetic patch face that one reminds me of old town with the crumbling towers beneath the sea that melisandre sees right come with me beneath the sea away away away away away away um i i can see it i can see it

uh i think a lot of people pointed out that when patchface talks about things like under the sea or beneath the sea whatever in his songs they're like that patchface is like like referencing the afterlife or death especially the way it is and i kind of wonder like our patchface's jingles like what are what are you saying to shereen like come with me beneath the sea is this like a siren song are you inviting to Shireen? Like, come with me beneath the sea? Is this, like, a siren song? Are you inviting Shireen to come die with you? I mean, like, she's gonna die, but maybe, like, not together.

Is this supposed to be foreshadowing for Shireen dying? I mean, skulls and crossbones is what she sees around that guy, so. Yeah. Once the children, well, Shireen, and patch face have run off, Jon tells Selyse that Tormund has accepted the terms.

Selyse says Stannis' wishes were to grant sanctuary to these, quote, savage peoples, unquote, and that if they hold the peace, they are welcome in the realm. Val is over there, too, and she's like, that's interesting that you call them savage. Did you know they have 200 giants and 80 mammoths? You know, just a humble flex, that's all. I'm not mentioning it for any reason right now.

She's, like, totally pissed. I mean, understandably, because Slyza's like, they're dreadful creatures. And she's like, at least they can help my husband in his battles. Right, like, in the same breath, she's like, I hate these horrible, awful, filthy creatures. Then she's like, that are horrible awful filthy creatures then she's like that are gonna win my battles for me uh kind of topical but kind of like all the people that

signed up for fafsa all the men that were automatically enrolled into the usa's blood oil wars huh huh we're gonna save your life and give you something valuable, but you also have to promise you'll die for us. Good luck. Love it. John is like, so the good news for you is that the mammoths are too big for the gate, and we can't widen it, so no mammoths. Sorry, Smile. She's surprised. She's like, oh, you're not

going to widen it? He's like, yes. There are obvious reasons for why we wouldn't want to make the gate larger you know like the whole reason why i'm having this entire political conflict within the night's watch right now and with northern lords and then you know no one gets it he's like i'm sorry you wanted me to make the gate bigger and let more people through and then later on you know maybe there's a threat right of undead mammoths it makes sense john makes sense oh my god she is unhappy obviously to say the least but

she moves on and she's like where are they all going to be settled then and he tells her the abandoned castles will be the new home for them, letting them defend the wall. She thinks the places they're putting them to live in are garbage, but Jon rebukes her and he says even ruins can offer shelter, and the wall from the others as well. Selyse is like, sure, but they have to address Stannis as king. Forever. Also R'hllor, as their new fire Jesus. And Jon's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, we didn't agree to those terms.

Those aren't the terms we talked about there, lady. Andza's like um don't really care the warmth vanishes from her voice yeah and John's like I know that trick too people see that my voices can be cold too anyways free folk do not kneel Val told her then they must be knelt, the queen declared. Do that, your grace, and we will rise again at the first chance, Val promised. Rise with blades in hand. Hell yeah. Waving that American flag. Freedom! When Jon is king in the north, because obviously we've just given in, we know what's going to happen,

the free folk following him that's so important like the free folk don't just bend their knee to someone and i don't think they'll want to bend the knee when danny comes around right i mean probably not probably not there that doesn't seem like a thing that they'll be into they'll be like maybe just because she's involved with John yeah but yeah they're very picky about who they choose and like obviously they want someone who respects their culture and John clearly does

which is why he's like hang on we tried doing the whole conversion thing once and A that was terrible B that makes people not want to come and join our side because it's erasing their culture let's not do that that's literally not part of the agreement and sleaze is like okay well fine whatever but you're gonna have to deal with stannis later and val needs to be wed to a man who's gonna teach her some courtesy and tells john that stannis will make

him answer for this on his return and john begs for leave and once again out of earshot val is pissed and i do think it's kind of funny that salise thinks that you know being wed to a man will teach her courtesy because as we've seen throughout this entire exchange being married to stannis has taught salise absolutely no courtesy whatsoever she's just like super full of herself instead uh and this is where of course val says the line that salise has more hair on her face than val has between her legs and then she moves on and she talks about shireen and her scaly ugly awful face that just screams death she says had she birthed shireen she would have given her the gift of mercy. The child is not

clean. Val is super about that vaccine life, and no matter what John says regarding the Maesters or Stannis, none of it shakes her. She says the gray death sleeps, only to wake again. John tries to argue his case, but Val says knows nothing which is the ultimate shut down shut down john line because he gets ptsd and he stops talking uh but she also says that she wants monster out of that tower the girl's as good as dead even if no one else can see it well she's not wrong on that note i mean the girl is as good as dead but lamb for slaughter just getting nice and uh marinated yeah so on this side recently was talking about chicken pox and of course uh shingles with people and you can get shingles if you've had chicken pox before which i guess is maybe maybe that's what it's drawing from maybe

that's why val thinks that it can reignite but i think i i was too old and the vaccine came out just a little bit after i got chicken pox so anyways yeah i just missed it i get you i just missed it um and i didn't know i had chicken pox and hid it from everyone and was like i don't know what's happening to me oh god that's awful i was like i'm so itchy what's happening um anyway and i guess i just kind of contradicted myself here but whatever the point is i'm not convinced that shereen is the reason for a grayscale outbreak because like i mean i think this is like meant to warn us a little and maybe there's a bit of a red herring there because some people suspect it's Shreen

but I think it's gonna probably be John Connington somewhere or something like he seems like a very very great patient zero he's very hasty now that he's on a timeline and has he's got goals and I think that rather the hate that Val shows towards Shreen here, because we know that Shreen's a very sweet cinnamon bun, is meant to show us that the free folk, just like the people south of the wall, maybe they have their own prejudices against things. It's not quite... We see it a little with Tormund, right? But maybe that's what this is.

I don't know. Yeah, and to be fair, most of their prejudices are true. But... I mean, it might not be with Shreen. This one, though. I don't know. Yeah, and to be fair, most of their prejudices are true. But this one, though. I don't know. Yeah. Well, and so something that I've really thought for a long time is that Val is going to have something to do with Shireen's death. Maybe not directly, maybe indirectly. I think that when Selyse leaves for the Nightfort, I mean, she very much so has enough people and manpower, especially with Jon not being there to help her, to take Val with her one way or another, right? I can imagine them forcing her to marry off and all the chaos, we'll see. she'll be a player in burning Shireen, even if it's only her words that help condemn her.

Even just that walk through the camp and seeing the sick free folk. I don't know. I had a funny, weird thought of like, what if everyone starts getting the shivers or something similar or the pale mare and Val blames Shireen somehow for it and they believe it. And that's a factor somehow.

I don't know. There has to be something, because Val has to be involved somehow. And maybe not directly, but I could see her being an encouraging factor. Yeah, for sure. Especially because what's at threat is Val tells john to bring her monster and strides off and john's like okay i need a cup of wine to deal with this day it's not done yet because now he has to go deal with as you say the boomers but like when val says for john to bring monster she's like bring me my monster she says my and i'm like val loves monster oh yeah she says she's she's

not fond of him but everyone's like we see you we see through your tsundere act he travels up the winch with leathers wind roaring through the cage passing by saying hello to the sentries standing guard and i did love this owen and ty are who are standing guard and they're covered in their winter wear head to toe he can barely see them but he still knows who they are by the way they are standing. His lord father had told him and Rob once that they have to know their men. So there's Ned's lesson still echoing. John looks off the edge of the wall, down where Mance's host had been defeated, and wonders if Mance had found Arya yet. He thinks about what she would look like now, and remembers what she used to look like,

dirty-faced with her skinny sword that Micken forged for her. He hopes that she's used it on Ramsay, if rumors of his viciousness have been true. Yeah, I do stand by theories that he won't know what Arya looks like, A, because now she's a faceless man but also i i think his memory of her will be foggy and i do think that i i think we're gonna see something like sad of him mistaking jane for aria i hope uh i hope to see how that goes i mean i just wonder about the crossover because if we're not going to get john till what like a quarter of the way in the book at the earliest a lot's gonna happen

a lot's gonna happen yeah yeah i mean maybe maybe you're right maybe he doesn't mistake her and it's just like while he's gone maybe the ghost is the dog is like i know it's not you but i'm gonna just chill and like i'm in and john's here too and i don't know who knows maybe she shows up wearing another face to you know see who these people are now oh i thought i thought i was talking about jane oh i'm talking about aria i'm sorry oh i figured maybe it's the same person i don't know i'm joking so aria's not the only family that he thinks about he starts thinking about sam and he thinks that sam made a very cruel joke when making him commander to crown him is to kill him sure is but also john thinks in this moment that a lord commander has no friends and i think that's

awfully close to a lot of the issues that overshadowed danny's storyline especially here in dan's ruling marine and it starts off at the end of storm where she thinks as she looks over the city like do all gods feel so lonely and how leadership has that very isolating effect yeah and no trust the cage draws up flint and nori are on it bow and marsh comes next then othel yarwick then septon selador who's already half drunk john has them walk with him and tells them in three days time at dawn the gate will open to torment and his people and that they have lots to prepare for they aren't enthused othel Yarwick starts to say that thousands of them are coming through, and he was likely going to say something completely awful and racist, and John interrupts

him and he's like, thousands of scrawny wildlings who are bone-weary and hungry, yes, they are coming through the gate. Well spotted, Othell Yarwick. Bowen Marsh, who has, in his opinion, never been wrong in his entire life, is like, actually, it's 4,000 if we were going to be exact. John. And he cites Dennis Malister's letters. There are more of them living in camps in mountains beyond the Shadow Tower. Yeah, I do appreciate that tuning sound like at first bowens like maybe it's more like 3 000 looking at the fires because i wouldn't be surprised if torment was inflating their numbers it would not be surprising to me all the other kingdoms do it dorn and their number of spears

is a really good example especially as they try and get the nares on their side i mean truly like you're just like looking out at a big crowd of lots of tents, people and guesstimating, let's be real. Like they're not going to go around counting every person in their army every day. Yeah. Also, I guess in retrospect, it would probably be better for Tormund to lower his numbers and be like, no, there's only this many of us. That's true.

Element of surprise. But that's the other thing John says right like when you have a certain amount of Night's Watch men against a certain amount of wildlings like the free folk don't fight as organized as these gentlemen these upstanding gentlemen

of the Night's Watch John tells them that the weeper though is going to try the bridge of Skulls again. And that is where Bo and Marsh got his face scar. He asked John, so, like, do you mean to let him through? John's like, I don't want to, but I will. Yeah, John thinks of the men that the Weeper had killed, those three heads, Black Jack, Hal, and Garth,

and how he can't really avenge them, but he'll never forget their names, which of course Ned taught him that too. John says peace means peace for all in his books, and they all eye roll and they hate him. And old Flint is like, my dungeons are peaceful, I'm going to take the weeper to my dungeons. And then he goes on to say that the weeper has raped or stolen or killed three of old flint's kin and says the weeper blinds the woman that he does not take yeah i mean we saw what he did believable i think that um you know john really thought that his talks with the flint and the noise i kind kind of wonder, did he really feel that this was going to go a lot differently? I mean, the Weeper, the Weeper is someone that we haven't really seen much in person, which is interesting.

He's basically the Ramsay or Euron of Beyond the Wall. And I'm not joking about that. I think that George has this weird thing where he tends to characterize how evil a character is by their propensity for sexual assault we see that first with joffrey and of course we see that with ramsey and you're on so and i mean it makes sense i guess to an extent of like that's how he thinks he can show this kind of villainy and trauma best you know what's the thing that george thinks is the most villainous but i don't know it's a little much and i do think john thought his talks with the flints and noris would go differently and you see that when he tries to pull the ned card later when he says that he is ned's son and they don't say shit and he's like

oh well that didn't work they like, like, completely gloss over it. They just, like, move on entirely. Yeah. John reminds them if the free folk take the black, they get to be reborn just like the rest of them at the wall. The Jellicle choice. Yarwick says that the men that follow the Weeping Man would do not trust him and would never take the black, and he would not either. John tells him you don't need to trust a man to use him. Who knows the wild better than a wildling? The men aren't convinced. Marsh is commenting that past the wall they have three times the watch's numbers. Easy, you can count the watch on one hand, just putting it out there. And that's Tormund's group alone. Add the weeper and

Hardhome and they could take the watch in a night. They begin to argue. John says there are sickly children and women in this camp by hundreds and thousands. And Sept and Salador is like, we should just go pray about it. Flint and Nori don't want the free folk to come near them either. They're like, they better stay off my lands. Yeah, John tells them, well, they're going to be garrisoning the abandoned castle soon. He's like, I've got a plan. I've got a plan for all of this.

He's like, men with wives and children. Alright, and then we're going to have orphan girls. We're going to have orphan boys. We're going to have old women. We're going to have widowed mothers and women who don't care to fight will be in some of those other castles along the wall. He's like, the spearwives are going to join their sisters in Long Barrow. And we're going to put the single

men in some of these other forts we've opened. John's like, I spearwives are going to join their sisters in Longbarrow. And we're going to put the single men in some of these other forts we've opened. Jon's like, I've thought this through. Those who take the black are going to go to Eastwatch, Shadow Tower, or stay here. And Tormund will take Oakenshield to stay close. He's like, I got this. You know, it's funny because there's an Oakenshield in the south of the Reach in the Shield Islands. So there's two Oakensh Shields in Westeros. And I am so proud.

Get ready. Oaken Shield's actually a Lord of the Rings reference. I knew this one, by the way. I knew this. Can you believe it? I can. I can believe it. So Tormund's Oaken Shield is named for Thorin the second oaken shield

who was king under the mountain or the mountain king so back to that mountain imagery with Tormund and Thorin leads the alliance of men dwarves and elves all united as one in the battle of the five armies so that's kind of like straight up a Tormund reference right

like Tormund's gonna lead an alliance he's gonna lead armies together of, you know, the Free Folk and the Northerners and other people. And Giants and Mammoths. The Dothraki, the Giants. Yes, all these different characters. The Snuffleupagus. Yeah, so I'm, I'm, uh,

I thought that was a cool reference. I can't wait to see that happen in real time. Yeah, I think that's a good I never noticed that there were two oaken shields i honestly realized it because i was like wait a second isn't oaken shield in the oh it's an abandoned castle too yes there's a southern and a northern one i mean that makes sense because like it's like when you got like streets south street and north exactly yeah yeah there's a lot of like places that have the same name marsh is like all right cool well what about their food consumption

because we're all gonna starve we don't even have butter anymore john he doesn't say it but he's thinking it john also has a plan for that and he lies about it he's gonna bring food through east watch allegedly by ship from all over westeros you know uh they go through each place where he wants to buy food from which is every region and i think it's like very obvious that sansa's gonna be bringing food home that little finger's been withholding right like to. Like, hopefully she'll leave some for the people left in the Vale to survive winter. But they literally are the only place that will have grain once the Reach gets their assholes handed to them from Euron. And maybe from Daenerys later as well. Yeah, because Littlefinger's been stockpiling it all for his bad reasons.

I, to an extent, kind of wonder, though, why does John feel the need to lie about taking a loan from the Iron Bank? Well, because I don't think he's supposed to. That's true. But, I mean, I just don't know why he would think that was worse than telling everyone that we're going to try and pay it with the baubles that we're taking from the free folk. Like, a loan from the Iron Bank sounds way more plausible.

It does, and I think Marsh might actually have even... He'd either have accepted it, or, like, straight 50-50 shot. It was either gonna be like, good call, I accept this, or it was gonna be like, dude, fuck you, John, you fucking traitor. And let's be real, it was always gonna be the second option. But... He's just a contrarian. I think he just doesn't like any of John's decisions. No, yeah. Absolutely.

And, I don't know, it's not that bad, but it is. It's still political. Like, it's still very, very political. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, John does tell them that they're gonna use the free folks riches to pay for food and nori says okay so those riches are gonna buy a bushel of barley corn at most and kleines is like well we could ask them to give up their arms and lovers

as we all know who is of the free folk laughs and asks, well, how do you expect to fight alongside them then? And John gives a basic history on the weaponry of the Free Folk. Yes, most Free Folk carry weapons that are barely more than your basic club or stick. Axes, mauls, spears, bone knives, and stone and dragonglass weapons, he notes. And I never noticed that until this read. That's an interesting thing that pops out to me that some of them are coming with dragonglass.

The Fens work with bronze and their raiders, like the other raiders, like weeper, steel kneeler weapons, swords off of corpses, but all these weapons are usually shoddy at best. Yeah. I'm so so furious i've started playing breath of the wild yeah and why can't i have my like a weapon that

fucking works for a long amount of time i'm just fighting everyone with like random clubs that i'm finding everywhere they break after like four hits i'm so annoyed that's that's that about breath of the wild when your branch breaks especially when you're like in the middle of fighting something um like when you're just trying to hit a animal and get their meat you know and then you're like no when they actually good fucking swords break and i'm like what is even the point of having nice things all right maybe there's symbolism you should google it is there i don't know what does a broken sword symbolize elliana yeah it can be reforged allegedly whatever i don't know but apparently it can't that's what i found out anyways game of thrones season four two swords taught me it could be anyways john says torment

would never disarm his people because that would be betraying their trust the other men distrust torment's oath to stay out of their lands flint nori septon selador then calls them savages again but leathers pipes up again to stand up for them and leathers needs a big shout out i i don't know if I've appreciated Leathers as much as I should have. Go Leathers. Yeah, throughout, like, he's been really great the past few chapters. And here, the patience of a saint, as he constantly listens to these guys, like, call for the eradication of his people over and over. Like, how he hasn't started wailing on anyone, truly. And he gives them this awesome mini speech that's very, like, to me, it was just an impassioned little speech where he tells them, I was on the other side once, but now I'm your brother.

Like, just like many of these people, I'm not savage, right? I'm no more savage than you guys. These people have families and gods, the same gods that Winterfell worships yeah though i kind of wonder like leather should have just gone for it right yeah not the gods and winterfell he should have been like the same gods you keep i know we have the same religion flint and nori and john track kind of tries to like say that by saying the gods of the north but i think that you know it solid or every few moments keeps trying to be like let's all have a prayer and i'm just like why doesn't leather do that he's like why don't we all go

say a prayer together and truly like places like the weirwood are holy like even if you don't worship those gods like haven't you ever walked by a place that you don't worship and been like what a beautiful building like full of spirituality i don't worship and been like, what a beautiful building, like, full of spirituality. I don't know. It's just really stupid. What closed-minded assholes. Or, or, here's an idea. What about a peace flint in Nori? Because you cannot tell a lie in front of a weirwood, allegedly.

Why don't they have... And I mean, like, the free folk who choose to join the watch, right, would say their oaths in front of a weirwood anyway but if they like did an oath of like yeah i'm not gonna fuck shit up in front of a weirwood in front of flint and nori like that's an idea unfortunately now they have to say their oath in front of a pile of twigs on fire so well shit john says trees yeah that's true if you join the Well, shit. A triplet and dory have trees.

Yeah, that's true. If you join the watch too, I guess you can do whatever you want-ish. Jon says that Tormund swore by those very gods, and Tormund will keep his word. Jon marched with him once, in case you forgot. And in case you forgot, that was the wrong thing to say, lol. Because Bowen Marsh is like, yeah, that's the issue. Jon, lol because bowen marsh is like yeah that's the issue john we know you marched with them that's why we're like the fuck

man's raider swore an oath as well that's i don't know if that's my bowen marsh voice i'm sorry everyone marsh went on he vowed to wear no crowns take no wife father no sons then he turned his cloak did all those things, and led a fearsome host against the realm. It is the remnants of that host that waits beyond the wall. Broken remnants. A broken sword can be reforged. A broken sword can kill.

The free folk have neither lords nor lords, John said. But they love their children. Will you admit that much much it is not their children who concern us we fear the fathers not the sons oh so much to unpack right there this is interesting because it's like it's a couple of different conversations it's the conversation ned had with robert about danny almost right like absolutely very much so a broken sword can be reforged a broken sword can kill and it also reminds me of some like major foreshadowing of what's to come of course all of this is sandwiched by john telling them he's taken

hostages much like what denarius is doing in marine and likely both groups of hostages, much like what Daenerys is doing in Meereen. And likely both groups of hostages might not fare so well, like with life. But some of that foreshadowing in there might be what's to come between Dany and Jon. They talk about Mance. He turned his cloak, did all those things, led a fearsome host against the realm. She loves her children. Will you admit that much? We fear the fathers, not the sons. I just think there's so much to unpack in this little passage about possibly Daenerys and Jon's relationship moving

forward, Jon leading her armies. A lot going on there. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that the show, the HBO award-winning television show, used some of that language, right? And I don't think that they were necessarily wrong for that. I think that was something that we are going to see.

Yeah, the sins of our fathers. Yeah. In probably better language, but yeah. Same ideas, literally. Hopefully better language, but yeah, same ideas, literally. Hopefully better language, I'm hoping. You know, the speech actually, poor Quentin and I were just chit-chatting about this, that the speech has a JFK reference in it as well. The JFK commencement address at the American University in D.C. in 1963. So let us not be blind to our differences, but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we

cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity. For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. Yes. That's what he's trying to do here. And John, in that vision, has taken 100 hostages, a son from each chief between the ages of 8 and 16, and then the rest, chosen by the free folk. They will serve the watch to help open up resources, and some may stay and take the block eventually, but the rest will stay to prove their sire's loyalty.

Tormund called this John's blood price, and Flint actually seems favorable of this. He says in the north we call them wards but we obviously all know it's a hostage thing yeah and he like literally says okay yeah we're familiar with that these are hostages and he's like favorable because he's familiar with it because for what it's worth when flint talks about these hostages they're like they were held

by winterfell of the flints and the norries these wards and which goes to show that despite all the ways that we're told that the starks were beloved by the north mostly through john's point of view and you know some of the other stark children as well there might not have been as much love as we think right and we see it also to an extent through catelyn's povs as she sees people serving serving rob but like it explains why all this pageantry of john and leather is parading the symbolism of winterfell and being constantly like yeah edard stork's blood flows through my veins like as you're saying earlier like it doesn't move the noise or the flints are like whatever

they don't talk about it at all and along with that it casts some light on a couple of things such as like why ned might have been reluctant to send out his own children as wards because he's like i know this this is a trick his own wardship was pretty happy enough but maybe he knows like i was pretty lucky all right i was the exception wards are hostages and it shows why Liza was so fearful of her child being taken by either Stannis or Tywin. Even though Liza was immensely distrustful and her paranoia was totally stoked by Littlefinger.

We see it with Myrcella, right? Being a ward to the Dornish. Cersei interprets it as a hostage situation and it's not entirely untrue.riane does crazy shit with with her ward and lastly like what the flint and the noise say of wards actually leads credence to theon's grudge about being a ward of winterfell because you know we debate

whether or not ned would have killed theon probably not but it doesn't change that theon himself knew what this wardship meant and that he felt unsafe being a hostage because there literally is a history of Northern Lords fearing that some Lord Stark, maybe not Ned Stark, but a Lord Stark would follow through on the threat. Jon Wen talking about the wards that were sent to Winterfell says none were the worst for it, but Nori interjects and says,

no, the one to displease the kings of winter came back short ahead. This is a northern tradition and established practice in Westeros. Yeah. I mean, and obviously, Ned was kind of like, lol, no one's leaving the house ever because that's what

happened the last time a stark left winterfell which was liana to go do shit you know like i mean that's that's obviously really tough but like you said he turned out fine he went to the and turned out better for it uh brandon stark was in barrowton at Lord Dustin's you know uh Edric Storm was passed around between Renly and Stannis like a basketball there there's so many different uh so many different fosterages in history and I mean Theon's is a little different because obviously it was a punishment it was you know for good behavior making sure they behaved but theon felt that he felt that on yeah like every day of his life i think that's a really great call out in general that you know not everybody worships the starks and you see it in the same book from barbara dustin

who yeah she worshiped them until she couldn't anymore because she couldn't be one i think it's when you there's something that you were saying and pointing out here regarding Brandon Stark being a ward to Barotin. There's that power dynamic, right? Like, of the wards. Like,

if you're a Lord Terramount, your wardship probably isn't a hostage situation because you hold more of the power but for vassals it's different yeah so they ask Jon

money where your mouth is if the time comes Flint and Noria are like are you able to kill your buddy if the time comes and they have not honored the peace that you want to bring which uh interesting question interesting question and john is doing that thing between all this where he's thinking he's been doing that throughout the whole book you know where he like thinks one thing says another and he thinks in his head ask jano slint very darkly interesting yeah

yeah uh you know who doesn't do that salise i'm pretty sure she says exactly what she's thinking and like yes we know john could do it for janos he's learned his lesson from the last time he said yes i've done this thing before like regarding a fight you know earlier he's like yeah i fought alongside them in case you've all forgotten and this time he's like i'm not gonna remind them about jano slint that seems like a bad move and yes he can do it for jano's could he do it for torment i don't know and this of course will later on evolve into a question like will he be able to do it when it's his queen yeah i don't know i think uh i don't know i don't know stick him with a pointy end or something i don't

know i don't know john responds to nori and he says tormund giant's bane knows better than to try me i might seem a green boy in your eyes lord nori but i'm still a son of eddard stark oh except you're not yeah and also lord nori looking into the camera yeah no one says shit like that didn't work sorry john didn't work yeah lord nori what is he thinking on the inside what is he darkly thinking inside and not right the second you know what nori is thinking he's like that little motherfucker that brandon stark i left him some goddamn oat cakes ungrateful little fuck those starks i'm just kidding uh so marsh is unhappy that john is implying he's to have these free folk kids trained at arms. And finally, the dragon comes out of John.

He tells him, he's like, I'd rather they be useful instead of standing around fucking, like, just, like, making frilly things all day. Idiot. I want them to tend to stables and chamber pots and churn butter and learn to fight. And this passage is so good. It's so important. It's's like we have to read it we will read it i just want to point out john's like the butter's so important to me how could you live without it well i agree marsh flushed a deeper shade of red the lord commander must pardon my bluntness but i have no softer way to say this. What you proposed is nothing less than treason.

For 8,000 years, the men of the Night's Watch have stood upon the wall and fought these wildlings. Now you mean to let them pass? To shelter them in our castles? To feed them and clothe them and teach them how to fight? Lord Snow, must I remind you you swore an oath? I know what I swore. John said the words again for the 80th time in this chapter. Literally. I am the sword of the darkness. I'm the watcher on the walls. I'm the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn,

the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men. Were those the same words you said when you took your vows? They were, as the Lord Commander knows. Are you certain that I have not forgotten some? The ones about the king and his laws and how he must defend every foot of his land and cling to each ruined castle? How does that part go? John waited for an answer. None came. I am the shield that guards the realms of men. Those are the words. So tell me, my lord, what are these wildlings, if not men? Bowen Marsh opened his mouth. No words came out. A flush crept up his neck. Jon Snow turned away.

Chills, dude. Get him. Get him, Jon. Get him. It was good. It was good. Jon finally got him. It doesn't really get through to a lot of them, but he got him.

As soon as I reread that today, I was so inspired. I was like, his power. The power. Everyone's speechless. shut him down fuck him up john i don't know maybe it's because i just came from christmas that was really tense because you know like white people and um i don't know like i'm sitting there like man i wish i could have gone off like that at christmas dude thanks john john an inspiration totally and as he lets lets the silence of the mic drop last for a bit the sun has begun to set and john thinks that melisandre will be praying to her fire soon chanting the night is dark and full of terrors he finally breaks the awkward

silence surrounding that sick targaryen burn with some house-stark ice coldness, and he's like, winter and the White Walkers are coming. The wall needs to be the last place that the White Walkers come to, and to do that, we need men. Tormund has men, do the math. So he orders Clytus to tend to the sick and injured and to save as many as he can. He charges Othell with readying cart and wagon for transport, and he tells Bowen to collect the tolls, sort them, count them, and make sure they get shipped out and get to Eastwatch. So I just want to say, as far as we know, right, Clytus is not one of those who participated in the mutiny at the end of Jon's life. And in this moment, when he agrees to Jon's decree to nurse the sick from Tormund's men, Clydus responds with, I will do my best, Jon. My lord, I mean. And I think that Jon kind of

somewhat got through to him because like here he says, yeah, he says Jon, not my lord at first. And I think that's him seeing Jon for who he is, for the boy he is, but not in a bad way, but for the boy who's trying to do something, not this adversarial Lord Snow. Because like, you know, back then, when people connected with him, they used to call him John. And all of these people who are like, pretty bad at John keep calling him like, Lord Snow, Lord Commander, whatever. And I think Clydus he got through to him yeah absolutely and I don't know well

so John did nothing but make political mistakes through this chapter right like yes you and I were like nope that was wrong nope wrong but he did something really good too little too late but he actually was managing really well he reached through to Clytus,

like you just noted. He gives Bowen the quote-unquote harder task, the one that uses more responsibility, right? All the very, very, very important treasures. He wants Bowen to collect the treasure. He wants Bowen to ship the treasure. He's making Bowen feel more self-important here, and he's trying to instill trust and respect, even though their relationship is quite obviously strained beyond repair right now. He gives Othell the charge of readying carts and wagons, and when we first meet Othell, he's first builder in A Game of Thrones, right? He almost was the Lord Commander. His name was up in the running. Jon is speaking to Othell's prowess

in building to establish these carts and wagons and ensure that they are safe and ready for transport. But the problem is that it's John that did this. He's just a smart-ass punk little bitch. So it's like, like we said earlier, they're not going to like what he does. Ever. It's not going to change, right? Like it it's not there's right now the only thing that could stop them from being mad at john would be like if he turned around and said you know what you guys you're right i'm gonna tell torment he should just turn around and go home yeah like that's literally it that's it or, you know, Jeremormon coming back from the dead and being like, you know what? I agree with Jon.

I like these. Yeah. I think those are the only two things that would work. But alas, it is not going to happen. So they each agree to their tasks, though semi reluctantly for a couple of them. Clydus is the only one that kind of was inspired to go. And then we have the closing quote, which is very good. Very, very good. And Jon thought. Ice, she said, and daggers in the dark, blood frozen red and hard and naked steel.

His sword hand flexed. The wind was rising. Yep. Chills. Chills from the winds of winter. And the ice. Oh my god. If ever. If ever. Well, you really gotta hand it to this chapter.

Yeah. Sword hand flex. Sword hands. Oh my god. Yeah. So, a dense John chapter, all foreboding,

especially with this last line of like, what's gonna happen at the end of the book? Mm-hmm. Yeah. gonna happen at the end of the book yeah um it's like you're so close john you get that something bad's gonna happen but it's like you can't quite put your finger on what it is i mean he kind of knows which is why the entire rest of the past few chapters he's just been like if you hate me then just kill me just do it he's like burying his chest yeah

he's been like they killed the last lord commander well you guys I don't know man I'm worried I'm really worried about this guy like what do you think do you think he's gonna die yes well I guess we're gonna have to wait another week Do you think he's gonna die? Yes.

Well, I guess we're gonna have to wait another week to find out what happens to Jon Snow. In next week's Dragon Ball Z. Yes, next week on the penultimate episode of Jon Snow. Our theme song. Oh yeah yeah that's right well guys thank you so much for tuning in this week we're really happy to be back in the new year new us just kidding same us new year new us uh if you guys have enjoyed today reach out send us a quick message on social media, either a tweet, a direct message that's

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