Here’s what I don’t understand about Arya’s storyline: Why is she even WITH the faceless men? When she first started out, she wanted to be a Water Dancer like her mentor Syrio. He was from Braavos just like the Faceless Men, but, clearly they are not the same school of training. I mean, when Arya was with the Hound looooong after her encounter with Jaquen, she was still practicing her Water Dancing moves. So, why did she decide to pursue the Faceless Men assassin squad instead of pursuing her dream to be a Water Dancer? These guys just seem to be creepy weirdos with all kinds of strange hard-to-follow rules and stuff. I think she would’ve been happier learning how to Water Dance and going off on her own and killing those on her list. Now she can’t even do that.
She didn’t exactly have a lot of options… she was on her own with nowhere to go and thought that the coin Jaqen had given her would help her get in with them, so that’s where she went. Plus have you forgotten about her hit list? An assassin’s guild seems like a perfectly appropriate place for someone with her ambitions.
She wants to stop being powerless. You think Sansa wouldn’t jump at the chance to learn to be an assassin at this point?
Yeah, things are going to get really ugly for her once Davos finds out about Shireen (she must have been beyond desperate to go back to the Wall knowing he’s there).
Good point; that street whore who flashed Cersei sure wasn’t afraid of the Sparrows. It’s been implied that Sparrows support among the common people is simply due to their charitable work rather than religious fervour (if that’s the case it makes it much easier for Oleanna to counter their influence). And I suspect most of the crowd really didn’t care about the Sparrows; they were just excited for a once in a lifetime change to see an unpopular highborn woman publically humiliated and to gawk and hurl insults (among other things) at her. Remember people have had their tongues ripped for saying much milder things about the Royal family behind their backs. The High Sparrow wouldn’t have tried the same thing with Margaery (Loras is another matter).
Tommen’s been king (at least on paper) since Joffrey stopped breathing, but he’s underage which is why Cersei went back to being Queen Regent (and now she’s back to Queen Mother with Uncle Kevan as Lord Regent). I don’t think Tommen marrying changed anything (& it’s probably very unusual for a king his age to marry, especially to an older woman, but the Tyrells pushed that union pretty hard). Granted it could be a case were the regency has technically ended, but the king is just so weak his “advisors” are running everything behind the scenes (this happed a lot in Earth history).
Oh, Ellaria is going to be in for a special kind of hell if/when Doran finds out; especially if this get’s Trystane killed.
I see that Arya wants to stop feeling powerless, but wouldn’t becoming a Water Dancer:
A) give her the power to fight and take care of herself PLUS
B) allow her to pursue her list without having to follow the rules of the Faceless Men?
Essentially, she’s still powerless. She has no choice in the matter. She can’t do what she wants.
She couldn’t even keep Needle. So basically, she becomes an assassin who has to follow the rule that a “life for a life” and only who we deem necessary to kill. You don’t get to choose. Not much power there. I hope she chucks it all and goes to find the Water Dancing School.
shrug People like Harlequin romances but I would find them boring and repetitive.
Yeah, Harlequin Romances and DE GUT PUNCHES!!!1
:rolleyes:
My take is, depending how you want to see it, she’s an out an out psychopath - ref. her demeanor and manner when killing this week, or she’s just consumed with vengeance (her list).
This Black and White/many faced clan are teaching her a whole new assassin skill set.
She is also a girl who likes girlie things, like dancing. Besides, even psychopaths dance.
Fwiw, I thought it was interesting last week when you could argue she was very close to breaking the 4th wall - her smile as she exited a scene walking past the camera.
Nobody was offering to make her a water dancer and she sure as hell wasn’t going to become one just going through her beginner moves over and over.
Yes they gained power quickly but there are precedence for this. Religion has taken hold of most of the populace before – the Great Awakenings in the US. The Second Great Awakening had giving up alcohol as one of its characteristics, so if the Sparrows are destroying brothels and pubs it would not be beyond the realm of possibility that the population of King’s Landing is not all up in arms. Depending on the end of the world/end of time beliefs of the Seven a widespread religious revival could easily fit well with the invasion of the White Walkers and their Army of Dead.
And looking none too sympathetic, either. That fell to Maester Mengele.
Many thanks for the mod reminders of the thread rules.
Everyone is talking about heading into season 6 with only Daenerys and Tommen being contenders for the throne, but what about Balon Greyjoy? There have been plenty of references to The War of Five Kings. By my count, those five were Renly, Stannis, Joffrey, Robb and Balon.
When Theon went to his father on Robb’s behalf it was to ask for Balon’s ships to sail Robb’s armies, the payment offered in return was that Robb as King of the North would somehow give Balon back his own sovereignty as King of the Iron Islands. Balon refused, reminding Theon that We Do Not Sow but that they take what is theirs (which is apparently whatever they want to be theirs) and said he didn’t need a wolf to give him a crown but would just take it.
Robb wasn’t looking to be King when he gathered his bannermen and began marching, he just wanted to free Ned. After Ned’s death, he just wanted to avenge his Dad and it was his guys that reminded everyone that the seven kingdoms used to be independent and only united under the Targaryens because dragons. They christened Robb the new King of the North and I thought that’s what Balon Greyjoy was after too, not the iron throne but independent sovereignty over his ancestral Iron Islands.
So if Robb was one of the contenders in The War of Five Kings, even though his goal wasn’t ruling the seven kingdoms, then Balon is still a ‘King’ that hasn’t been dealt with. If I remember right, he sent Asha and company to take Dreadwood Motte and they were still holding it until Ramsay Bolton ousted them…he must have been doing other stuff besides just that to have been given the status as one of the serious challengers. I don’t remember any other important battles between the Iron Islanders and the Baratheon forces, or the Lannisters, or the Starks even.
So what’s up with him? Is he still a contender? He was important enough to be kingsblood-leech cursed as a usurper by Stannis, he was important enough to be included in the dwarf reenactment at Joffrey’s wedding, so it stands to reason we’re not done with that storyline.
Like Robb, I don’t think Balon ever wanted to be “king of Westeros”, merely king of the Iron Islands, using the war to help him break away. Theon took Winerfell, Yora and the other Ironborn weren’t impressed, as that’s not their game.
I was planning on it but I was too late.
If Jon isn’t really dead my take on it is that Mel will revive him and she was shown a vision that is what she is supposed to do. I don’t think her attitude was necessarily a loss of faith but perhaps she was shown that to save Jon she must sacrifice herself? Or maybe she just had grown rather fond of Stannis and felt sad about all the time she wasted on that storyline?
Sansa’s bad timing in going to the tower when Brienne actually stepped away felt like when you wait all day for a repair-person then go to the bathroom for a few minutes and come out to find they had shown up and left again during that time.
The more I consider it the more I WANT Jon to be dead dead.
This would be a PERFECT chance to shift the story into gear and show the audience shit just got real, and show that everything that came before was kid gloves. The unresolved stuff with Jon like if Rheagar is his father? None of it matter because frigging army of the dead thats why!
Sam is now the most important person in the world due to the info in his head on walker vulnerability.
Does it matter? Just don’t do it. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.
At the start of the war of five kings there’s only one crown. Three of the five (Joffrey, Renly, Stannis) are fighting for that crown. The two others are fighting to create new crowns for themselves.
The guys from the Nights Watch wish a crew members son Kevin a happy birthday.
Sorry about that. The video has been made private.
Better link
If Doran finds out about the assassination attempt, Ellaria is screwed whether Myrcella dies or not. I hope he does.
Several people have already mentioned the lack of opportunities for Arya to become a Water Dancer (keep in mind she had to use the coin to even get someone to take her to Braavos).
In addition to that, I don’t think becoming a Water Dancer would give her much more flexibility than a Faceless Man. Braavos is all about service and duty. Remember the whole “all men must die”/“all men must serve” thing? The Faceless Men may or may not have more ritualistic and religious trappings than the Water Dancers, we don’t know. But I sincerely doubt that Arya would have been allowed to become a Water Dancer and then just strike off on her own so she could finish off her list.