So Do We... Strike? Sign A Petition To Maintain Discord Independance..?

What, pray tell, does golf have to do with vampirism?

The Mormont women live and breath the Mama Bear trope: fierce, loyal, no-nonsense women with their own brand of sweet tenderness who *can and will* fight tooth, claw, and sinew to defend their home and family.

Brave companions used black bear in fighting pit in Riverrun. Dany called Jorah her black bear in ASOS. His sigil also had black bear on it. Then the bear in Bear and the Maiden Fair is described as having black and brown furs. Do you think black bear is indicating something?

Hi anon!

I'm extremely ambivalent about how GRRM uses bears. There's no one recognizable theme like with dogs. The best I've arrived at so far is that bears can represent questionable mentor figures.

Sansa in the Vale is compared to a bear cub (with Littlefinger her horrible "father"), Dany compares herself to a bear cub withJorah, the fugitive slaver who both advises and molests her, then you have Jon with Jeor Mormont, who hands him the transformed family blade that used to be a bear - but was turned into a wolf, making him a pseudo "father", who is both a useful teacher AND a misguided leader of the Watch, but leaving Jon in charge of his own wolfy fate, eventually.

Arya watches the black bear kill Amory Lorch and feels reminded of Yoren, her second (and violent!) mentor after Syrio, but that same bear is turned against Brienne as a precurser to threatened rape and murder, and the bear is killed when Jaime returns to save her. 

In the song "The Bear and the Maiden Fair", the male bear is another beastly sexual predator.

On the other hand, the ladies of House Mormont are generally depicted as loyal protectors and independent leaders. Dacey is Robb’s loyal guard, while Maege is trusted to carry out a vital mission for him. Lyanna Mormont has no qualms about rejecting Stannis, steadfastly sticking with House Stark. Asha is undeniably impressed with “Aly” Mormont, who protects Asha from the fire-mad R’hllor adherents in spite of the ancient enmity between their people. 

Tormund’s story of the she-bear who sheds her skin mirrors Alysane’s story about the Mormont ladies being skinchangers who mate with bears in the woods. The bear goes her own way. No husband necessary. 

The Mormont men? Absent, dead, deeply flawed, irrelevant.

There is a clear and constant rift between the female bear and the male bear. 

If I had to make a guess, I would suspect that the bear image is about growing beyond a flawed system. The mentor that protects the various characters can transform into a weak leader, a traitor, a predator. Independence is better. Growing up is necessary. Responsibility for one’s own fate is necessary. 

Be that as a she-bear, or a wolf. (Or a dragon.)

Genuine question from someone who has only read "Thrones" and the first handful of chapters in "Clash of Kings": has Arya shown *any* interest whatsoever in ruling? I thought her main personal theme was about freedom and identity, and her slipping into chaining herself to vengeance and letting her anger twist her runs counter to both, stealing her freedom and identity away, and thus must be overcome.

If that is indeed the case, then how can folks say they are Arya fans while ignoring her central, series wide arc?

Ok this is very random but it has being bothering me for a while. The stans use the “you’ll marry a king” line as foreshadowing for Queen @rya but even if it were...here’s the thing: when you marry a king you are a queen consort. No power, you are only there to provide heirs and your standing hangs on your husband’s will. Ask Anne Boleyn how much her position as Queen protected her once her husband got tired of her. Heck, even in universe we see poor Ellia completely vulnerable once Rathgar humiliated her in public.

Married to a king would put @rya in a similar position to Ellia Martell or Cersei. The only power Cersei has right now hangs by the thread of Tommen’s life. Her kingdom is falling apart already and when he dies she will fall like a house of cards. Wives of kings do not rule on their own.

Sansa on the other hand will rule on her own right as the oldest sister of King Robb, the last King in the North. Her position as Queen does not depend on any man, her power comes from her Stark name and not a marriage, therefore she can marry -or not- freely.

So, you know, that foreshadowing is not exactly what they think it is.

> not exactly what they think it is.

Arya fandom in a nutshell.

Let em know @minitafan! Bravo.

That fandom forever clinging to that passage is the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen. Can you imagine how hard they have to work to look past her father talking about one of his children sailing the Sunset Sea sentences before? That has to be a struggle, I don’t envy them.

Sailor Moon is going to sail the ocean blue, and they can die mad about it.

Friendly reminder that direwolves were very very real in case anyone thinks Neil or George made them up:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/dire-wolf-dna-study-reveals-surprises

Sorry if this has been asked before, but was Lucifer's "I am a dire wolf?" a reference to GOT because of Gwendoline Christie?

Not unless the Dire Wolves in GOT were George’s reference to Sandman. That’s from the original (1989) comic.

Ozpin: "Did you tell her to try working the shaft?

Oscar: "Yes, Professor."

Ozpin: "Good work."

Oscar “Tech Support” Pine. Alternatively…

Please?

Sooooo Mickey 17 edit with The Fine Print when

Hail to the queen, baby.

👑

🦖

Here’s one good thing to come out of 2020:

Paleontologists completed a life-sized replica of Sue, the most complete T. Rex ever found.

And she is freaking GORGEOUS!

As I read more about this beauty, I found out some new details regarding things I thought I previously knew about the beast that was Tyrannosaurus Rex, and I’m going to share them with you.

First, and most obvious, her size:

This is nothing new, we all figured T. Rex was big, but I for one never stopped to consider exactly how big it was. Nobody ever really knows what to imagine when they read about something the size of a whale that walked around and ate everything it could kill. 

Speaking of eating things, I just want to remind you all that T. Rex had–by miles–the strongest bite of any terrestrial animal living or dead, somewhere around six and a half tons of force. That’s over six times greater than the current estimate of what Allosaurus was capable of, and three times what was delivered by the highest measured reading of the living title holder–the estuarine crocodile. It didn’t have to waste time swinging its head open-mouthed like Saurophaganax for a little extra oomph, or grow fancy serrated teeth like Carcharodontosaurus to cut pieces out of its prey. It opted for the simplest approach: get its mouth around something and crush it to death; imagine the full weight of an elephant on whatever was between this thing’s jaws.

“How did it find something to eat?” I hear you asking. “It can’t see something if it doesn’t move, right?”

Listen, I love Jurassic Park too, but that’s a big crock of shit.

Notice how both her eyes face forward. That gives her binocular vision (the ability to focus both eyes on one target, like you and I). More importantly it means she has impeccable depth perception due to overlapping fields of vision from each, large, eyeball. Researchers agree that T. Rex not only had incredible vision, but that it was probably better than most modern animals–including eagles, hawks, and owls–and that she could likely spot something three and a half miles away. If something that big can see that well, it doesn’t matter if you move or not, she’d be able to tell if it was an animal trying to hide or a piece of vegetation. So pray she isn’t hungry if she lays eyes on you. And even if by some miracle she didn’t see you, she’d still smell you. 

If she decided you looked tasty, you probably wouldn’t hear her coming as much as you’d feel her. Modern science indicates that T. Rex didn’t roar like in Jurassic Park, but rather bellowed or maybe even hissed like crocodilians. If she were on to you, you’d most likely feel this sense of unease creep up your spine as a low-pitched rumble in the air permeated through you. You wouldn’t know what it was or where it was coming from until you hear her footfalls. By then it’s too late–you could try to run but she’d probably catch you. There’s plenty on YouTube that reconstructs what T. Rex may have sounded like, and it’s legitimately haunting.  

To wrap all of this up, the one bit of good that came out of the cursed year that is 2020 is that this wonderful child of science and art came into the world, and reaffirmed my respect and admiration for the eight ton slab of muscle and teeth that is this magnificent creature.

…and it is nothing if not magnificent.

Jason dons this uniform anytime a) a fellow counselor or camper says anything even vaguely homo- or transphobic b) as a sign of solidarity any time a lady counselor gets catcalled or shamed for their choice of uniform c) whenever its particular hot out and he feels daring.

Was watching Sleepaway Camp earlier, and I had to replicate those lovely early 80s outfits.

you know what would have been great? if ron got sorted into slytherin.

imagine– we have this kid on the train, the first friend harry meets, with his corned beef sandwiches and smudged nose. ron is eleven years old and he wants gryffindor, because he’s a weasley and that’s what always happens. but it doesn’t happen.

what a way to redeem slytherin house– or, god, at least complicate it. because ron is petty. he is mean and sharp and ambitious and jealous– and he is loyal to the ends of the earth. he is all those things, and he is and always has been good.

potter becomes before weasley in the alphabet, so harry says not slytherin please and gets told might as well be gryffindor. percy and fred and george are all sitting there in red and gold, ruffling the already-ruffled hair of the boy who lived, smug, and then ron sits down and the hat spits out slytherin!

c'mon it’d be fun. just imagine–

the weasleys freaking out– but even that first christmas molly sends him a sweater in beautiful green and silver.

snape taking points from gryffindor when ron breaks rules or mouths off. “i’m in your house.” “hm, couldn’t tell which weasley it was…” /drifts away

sitting with harry in potions and in flying– whatever classes they happen to share. meeting up to study. scarfing down their breakfasts at separate tables so they can go hang out in the empty classrooms before the day starts. hermione reads while they play exploding snap.

the trio signing up for all the same electives third year. this friendship being something they earn and work for; not just the one that looked easiest. (not to bash canon ron&harry, the bros to end all bros, but by putting this very obvious obstacle between them– it makes it that much clearer to the reader that this is a love worth fighting for, because they’re fighting for it).

ron being jealous that harry and hermione get to share this house, this home, these hours, while he’s stuck with malfoy and parkinson and goyle– because that would eat him up some days, some months, this insecure kid who’s been the last at everything all his life. this kid who always leaves and always comes back.

ron, who constantly compares himself to his brothers– not as smart, not as popular, not as good. one more nail in that coffin, here, yeah? he’s not a prefect, not a quidditch star, not a troublemaker– and even when he becomes those things, someone else has always gotten there first. 

well, i guess he got to this house first at least

ron still snaps at snape in potions, after hermione’s been ignored three times, “you know, sir, i think hermione might know the answer.” he still pulls the bars off harry’s window with a stolen, flying car. he still shows harry around the burrow shyly, not knowing what a wonder a warm home is. he still stands up in the shrieking shack as best as he can with a broken leg and tells a mass murderer that if he wants harry he’ll have to go through him first. 

ron weasley is a lot of things, but one of them is absolutely a true friend.

in their second year:

when everyone calls harry the heir, they eye ron at his side and sniff.

when hermione lays petrified in the medical ward, ron sits at her side and reads her homework assignments aloud and thinks my house this was my house. 

when ron hugs ginny’s damp, shaking frame after the chamber, ron says sorry and sorry and are you okay and i’m so sorry and ginny calls him an idiot.

the trio spends more time in the library with hermione, since ron can’t come to gryffindor tower to study, and homework remains a thing that has to happen. fred and george constantly try to sneak him into the tower anyway. 

“c'mon, ronnykins, you belong here, you deserve it, no one’s gonna fuss, it’s your BIRTHRIGHT,” and ron fusses and rolls his eyes at them

and then in fourth year in one of those periods where he’s not talking to harry and harry’s not talking to him– he just snaps at the twins

because it’s not, alright?

not his birthright, not his house, and maybe no one would fuss if he snuck in, maybe no one would care, and that makes it worse not better, because then he’s just that weasley who should’ve been gryffindor

and isn’t

(and harry overhears this caterwauling, feels his heart fall to his toes, and goes and awkwardly asks ron if he wants to go a few laps on his firebolt). 

(because, god, harry-the-chosen-one, harry-in-the-cupboard-under-the-stairs, harry-who’ll-save-us-all– he knows what it’s like to have should have beens on your shoulders, and he knows what it’s like to not be wanted).

ron cheers for gryffindor during quidditch matches in those first few years, and sits with hagrid and hermione and neville. harry’s seeker, and fred and george are beaters, and ginny becomes chaser eventually, and honestly screw the slytherin team. they have each and every one of them said disparaging things about ron’s mother.

harry and hermione badger ron into trying out for keeper fourth year; he and harry have been practicing on the quidditch pitch because its a non-library-shaped place to hang out where both of them are allowed. ron makes the slytherin roster, and malfoy grudgingly provides ron a team broom after the captain chews him out for a bit.

“he may be a weasley, but he’s our keeper, don’t you want to win, draco”

but the sort of things they spit in the locker room, the words the players hiss or snigger, the slurs that come easy to their tongues– ron would like to say that he considered just walking out of the cesspit, but instead he snipes and sasses and shouts and sometimes tries to spell slugs at the worst of them. 

it doesn’t do much, that one irritated voice of protest– except that it does. and he’s got a new (hand-me-down) wand, after the gilderoy fiasco, so the slugs even come out the right end.

fred gives him a black eye with a bludger one time (though ron does manage to block the quaffle) and molly sends a howler to gryffindor table with the morning post. (“RON DID YOU TATTLE”) (“IT WAS CLEARLY PERCY, FRED, SIT DOWN”)

(the weasleys often have family conversations across the great hall, with hufflepuffs and ravenclaws covering their ears long-sufferingly between them)

in the lake, it’s still ron hanging there in the water, still and bloated. it’s still harry’s heart that stutters in his chest, for all it’s just a game, just a game, just a game, right?

ron listens hard and tries to talk himself out of fist fights, all that next year in the slytherin common room as they read aloud rita skeeter articles.

when hermione calls dumbledore’s army to its first session in that pub, there are green scarves in that crowd– ron and one of the beaters who ron’s gotten to help glare to rest of the slytherin quidditch team into submission.

ron beats draco to being prefect (i think i remember it was dumbledore and not mcgonagall who seemed to award prefect status– snape doesn ’t get a say).

percy is SO PROUD, as usual, but so are fred and george. “did you see the little malfoy git? green with shame, my god.”

when harry has the dream about sirius, ron isn’t there to wake. but when draco’s pulled out of bed to be a professional bully– er, i mean inquisitorial squad member– ron follows at a careful distance and curses draco from behind. 

they ride thestrals over london. harry finds the prophecy and ron thinks about the sorts of things that get decided at your birth.  

sirius black was a son of slytherin who had a lion living in his chest that he couldn’t hide away. 

ron was meant to be gryffindor, and through a haze of injury and fear he watches sirius die just out of harry’s reach.

just imagine: ron with his temper and his sharp words and his fierce loyalty. ron who looks into the mirror of erised and sees house cups and prefect badges and ambitions earned– he could belong in slytherin. there is nothing wrong with wanting things, and he wants them so bad.

there are so many reasons to fight a war, and so many ways. harry and his sacrifices, his loving resignation. hermione’s good right hook and bottomless bag of supplies. luna, brilliant and a bit batty. lee jordan’s radio and mcgonagall’s burning patience and brittle, certain bones.

just imagine: when the last battle comes, there is a slytherin on the field who is not snape.

when draco and his parents walk away, in that last battle, ron–

who slept in the same dormitory as the boy for six years

who heard draco’s nightmares and saw him paling and desperate all sixth year

who is as pureblooded as lucius’s spoiled whelp

who remembers grimacing at the thought of squibs

who has known magic all his life

who spotted draco penning letters home to his mother every sunday and hiding them when the other boys could see–

ron sees them going.

he sounds no alarms. he says no farewells.

he turns back to his friends, and his fight, and lets them be.

just imagine: when harry kneels on the train platform and his second son asks him “but what if i get sorted slytherin, dad?” harry can say, “the bravest man i ever knew was in slytherin house. whatever you are, wherever you go, we’re going to be so proud of you." 

and they can both gaze over to where ron is squawking beside his daughter’s trolley of luggage because crookshanks (who will live to be forty eight million years old) has latched onto his shins with a violent fondness.

I actually think Jaime and Cersei won't make out of twow. Aegon will hold King's Landing against Daenerys, not Cersei i.e, a much more likable monarch, making Dany's actions even more horrific. And Jaime's plot for S7/S8 didn't even make sense. But they will die together, of that I am sure.

(in reference to this post)

I agree. I think Dany's choice to take KL from Aegon is far more interesting than for her to fight Cersei because killing Cersei would have no personal significance, debating whether or not Aegon is who he claims to be, deciding he is a fraud whether that’s a genuine belief or merely a convenient one, it allows a lot more inner turmoil. Also, I believe Martin said something about us getting a little Targ war, a mini dance of the dragons 2.0, so it seems likely the two will have a fight over the throne. But even without Martin's comment, in the books themselves he's ramping up to it with this:

"A dragon eating its own tail, aye," Valena said. "From the days of Aegon's Conquest. He did not conquer here. Elsewhere he burned his foes, him and his sisters, but here we melted away before them, leaving only stone and sand for them to burn. And round and round the dragons went, snapping at their tails for want of any other food, till they were tied in knots." (TWOW, Arianne I)

which is yes, history, but also signaling what is to come for House Targaryen. They fight and kill each other, it’s fitting that that is how they go out. And we know they will, that although Rhaegar was "the last" and that Viserys thought he was the last, in truth, Dany will be the last:

And saw her brother Rhaegar, mounted on a stallion as black as his armor. Fire glimmered red through the narrow eye slit of his helm. "The last dragon," Ser Jorah's voice whispered faintly. "The last, the last." Dany lifted his polished black visor. The face within was her own. (AGOT, Daenerys IX)

So for her to kill a Targ claimant to take the throne and then be killed in turn makes sense to me.

I now can’t remember if there was a specific line that convinced me Jaime and Cersei would die together, maybe it was just Jaime saying it (“We will die together as we were born together”) that planted the idea, but before s8 I had accepted it as inevitable. There is an entire section of this post by @istumpysk with quotes/spec about how.