Katsullivan

We got the answer last episode when she was sucking his dick.

? Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus. ? That would explain why the moment Jaime arrived on King's Landing and found out that Cersei had done what he killed Aerys to prevent he turned against her once and for all. Oh wait.

YMMV, but I've always read her declaration of being the Last Targaryen as her pride of being from her House, and having the blood of the dragon, of her pride at surviving, and as pride of her House surviving through her. I distinctly remember a scene where Tyrion and Dany discuss about her being disadvantaged by being the last member of her House, and the emphasis was on her isolation. The TV show fails in many places, but by keeping her brother's names to the dragons, it's still paying lip-service to her feelings of isolation and loneliness. Of course, this also tied to her "barren-ness" and her awareness that her House ends with her, and the way she cherishes her dragons as babies.

Direwolves exist. In the world of Westeros they are near extinction but they aren't inherently magical, except the ones that are "bonded" to the Stark children. Now the question is whether that's because the direwolves are magic themselves or because the Stark children have First Men/warg magic in their blood like that wildling did. If we want to argue whether magic existed in this world pre-dragons, we only need to look at the Wall which is a piece of magical architecture. Dany hatching her dragons released a quantity of magic/ an ability to manipulate magic that had apparently been lost for a long time. It's a theme repeated several times in the books. GRRM said that the title works on several levels, and has several meanings. It's entirely possible that it means Jon's heritage and Jon & Dany coming together in every sense of the word (including sexual romantic) to fight the coming doom. Boatsex is happening, and a little ice+fire Targaryen baby will be next.

I'm also laughing at @doram's post. I certainly see Dany's "barren-ness" causing all kinds of drama between these two until she gets her Surprise! Baby. I'd love to imagine a HEA for all three of them (Dad, Mom & baby Targ) but I have to agree that it's more likely that one parent (Jon) will die, probably at the hands of the other (Dany) for the GreaterGood(R). Most likely, neither Jon nor Dany will sit on the Iron Throne but their child will, and start a dynasty that will last for a thousand years.

Yeah, this is fake. And by fake, I mean bad Jonsa fanfiction fake.

Another change from the books because book!Dany was raised to believe that she'd marry her brother and she felt betrayed by him when he sold her to Drogo instead. In the books, the Targaryens are raised with the concept of incest being normal and it's evident in all that they think and do. So one of Egg's sisters tries to slip him a love potion so he'll favor her over their other sister, and Egg is irritated by this because he doesn't want to marry anyone, he wants to be a Knight. He's not irritated at marrying any of his sisters, just the idea of being married at all. Aemon Dragonknight is in love with Naerys, and it's depicted as a tragic love story, a Lancelot/Guinevere/Arthur if Arthur was really Henry 8. Rhaenyra had a crush on her uncle, Daemon, etc. In the books, finding out Jon is related to her after they've started a love affair will endear him even more to Dany. I can imagine her wanting him to automatically shift his loyalties to Targaryen and struggling to understand why he, in turn, is struggling with what he feels towards Ned about the deception. Dany constantly reminds herself "I am the last dragon" with great sorrow, and I expect that her first reaction at realizing this is not true will be extreme joy.

I'm sure she'll rule brilliantly. How well that would make sense for the story or how much other characters will suffer to make Sansa look brilliant is what I'm not sure of. And like @anamika pointed out so well, it's not the first time that this Royce was made to look like an idiot for Sansa's sake.

I blame the TV show. I'm not going to bring up the sore topic of adaptation vs fanfic but I will say that American TV tends to "dilute" good female power and this is an example of it. It's one thing to let Evil Cersei be ruthless and goal-oriented and single-minded because that's what Female Villains do (and that's why they are Villains because powerful women are dangerous, dontchaknowit?) but once we moved past the books, they started writing Dany as someone who wrings her hands and worries about collateral damage. I'm not saying that Dany worrying about collateral damage is OOC. She has always been more smallfolk-minded that most of the other nobility on this show. But the show has taken it to an extreme where she's effectually powerless and when she does exert strength, she's regarded by Tyrion as potentially crazy and Jon, her love interest, is "disappointed" in her for not living up to the non-existent pedestal he's placed her on. Also, the idea of Dany asking Jon for advice on how to win her wars is enraging. Dany didn't need Barristan or Jorah to sack Astapor. She didn't look away when she marched towards Mereen. Before Tyrion Dinklage showed up, she would take advice from all her advisors and come to a decision based on her instincts and their counsel. But Tyrion shows up and she does everything he tells her to do. Now apparently, we're going to have to sit through episodes of Dany talking, and then side-eyeing Jon for approval. Kill me now. ? Actually he was advising her not to. Or did I get something wrong?

Well I already said that the entire purpose of the scene was to prop up Sansa so there's nothing to disagree with here. Of course, if the only way they can make Sansa look good at anything is to make other people stupid then that doesn't say much about her. That's a lot to expect the audience to assume from one scene. We know that several Northern lords still have standing armies, with I assume, experienced generals in charge. But we're to assume that Jon left one of Littlefinger's men in charge of equipping his army? IF (and that's a big IF) that really was some random Vale advisor organising Northern armies, then Sansa comes across as stupid and incompetent because the first order of her business as Lady of Winterfell would be to appoint a Master of Arms from the North who actually knows what he's doing and not someone who may or may not be in Littlefinger's pocket. Smart leaders surround themselves with competent people and delegate accordingly. We're constantly told about how clever and suave and worldly-wise she is, but between this and her need to keep Littlefinger close by, we're not being shown it.

There was no wool. There was no lining in the armour. And the way the way the conversation went, Sansa was reminding the Master of Arms that the armour needed leather when the "real Winter set in." He didn't say "oh, we only keep leather for the Lords but there's wool for the foot soldiers" or "that's what the wool is for". He went "Oh, yeah, that's a great idea, Lady Sansa! I'll get to it." It had never even occurred to this seasoned Master of Arms to line the armour at all. It's nice to show Sansa trying to do her best but when they need to make everyone else stupid to prop her up, it's ridiculous story-telling and personally, it threw me out of that scene completely.

As someone said above, Dany lists her titles almost like a resume. She didn't rule smoothly in the territories she conquered in Essos but she learned the hard lessons of ruling and she stayed to learn them when she could easily have travelled West with her army and dragons. Also it's a catch-22. If Dany's rule in Essos had been smooth and strife-free, she'd be accused of being a Mary Sue who makes no mistakes. Since it wasn't, she's accused of being a failure (even though she does establish peaceful rule and trade in the cities while keeping it slavery free). That's wrong and it's a sad part of society's misogyny that a woman talking herself up is regarded as her being bitchy especially when she's up against a far less qualified man, something that happens in both fiction and real life. Dany's apology for Aerys was not "bitchy" or arrogant and actually threw Jon because he wasn't expecting it. She then extended a hand of friendship, asking him to take up being Warden and support her being Queen. If she was really being Aegon-Arrogant, she'd have simply said "? There can only be one.?" You're also forgetting that there was a serious lack of communication in that room. Jon came to Dragonstone thinking he was invited as an ally. Dany sent out an order to her subject to come and tell her his story and bend the knee. Neither knew that Tyrion had "translated" the message Dany sent. Jon showing up to Dragonstone, refusing to bend the knee and demanding her help struck Dany as him being arrogant. Dany's losses are actually his losses more than hers. Because she can still win her war - but it's going to take longer and use all* her resources. So she'll take longer to help him with his Northern/Wall problem and she'll have less men to spare to help him mine dragonglass or join his Army. *You're forgetting that Dany never needed the Tyrell or the Dorne or the Ironborn. She had her army and her ships and her dragons. She could have marched to Westeros and scored a victory 2 seasons ago if she was willing to go the "Scorched Earth" route. The whole point of using the Tyrells and Dorne was to avoid the bad optics of "Foreign Invasion Army". In that plan, the Dothraki were entirely redundant and the Unsullied were only going to score a "Moral victory" of winning Casterly Rock. Well that's failed. If she wants to co-opt the Northern Army, that's tantamount to her repeating the same mistakes and expecting different results. Strategically too, the Northern Army - all the way above the Neck - have even less chance of getting to her on time than the Unsullied across the continent. Right now, Dany's best option is to take the army that she does have, and her dragons and do Scorched Earth against the Lannister armies and Cersei's allies. So nope, I'm guessing that it's still going to be Jon begging for dragon-fire and Dany's help in the weeks to come, and now with even less hope of getting them when he needs to.

The conflict was just there for Teh Drama. There's no logical reason for Jon not to kneel if that's what he needs to do to get the help that he needs. Like Tyrion pointed out, it's basically a meaningless gesture and he keeps saying he doesn't want to be King but when he's actually compelled to give it up for the Greater Good, he baulks. Him saying that the North will be betrayed if he kneels is laughable because the North will die if he doesn't.

So basically, a Sansa fan (because that's who it was) criticised Dany and a Dany fan pointed out the hypocrisy in that ---- and you conclude that it's the Dany fans who keep bringing Sansa up? I can't even be bothered to counter that list because there's so much in it that's contrived - you're equating the Unsullied whom Dany liberated to Sandor who just liked Sansa because ... she was pretty and could sing? You're also counting Drogon and Dany's dragons - and Dany's fire-proofness - amongst the list of men in love with her and not as an extension of herself. By the way, Sansa also had her magical creature - she had Lady. Whom she lost through her own actions. It's never been about who suffered the most. It's about which female character has had more agency from her own actions and/or powers and which female character is merely a pawn or object in other men's stories. Dany's the former, Sansa's the latter.

Lancel & Ramsay don't count as men who've given Sansa anything but if you're going to bring them up, then you should consider that Dany was kidnapped by a khalasar that threatened to gang rape her, and that even though Jorah and Daario showed up to rescue her, Dany ended up saving herself by burning the Khal and his "inner court" alive. Or that Sansa had 4 loving brothers including the half-brother that she looked down at growing up, but Dany was brought up by Viserys "Joffrey" Targaryen who cooly threatened her with gang-rape and wanted to cut her foetus out of her belly. As for Drogo? Dany never got anything from him. He might have "fallen in love with her", but it certainly gave her nothing since he died, leaving her arguably worse off that she was before she married him and it was her walking through fire by herself, her own will and her belief in her own power, that hatched her dragon eggs. Let's not discount that their "Perfect Love" started with him repeatedly ass-raping her, and that she basically Stockholm-Syndromed herself into falling in love with him or commit suicide. Jorah saved Dany’s life ONCE. And considering that her life was in danger in the first place because he was spying on her, then I think his rescue of her just barely cancelled out his betrayal of her. Dany has done more rescuing of the people in her life than the other way around. I'll give you Daario though. But that is one case of a man choosing Dany because of his love/lust for her without her first: proving herself to him or being endangered by him. Meanwhile, Sandor saved Sansa from Lolly's fate just because. He held back himself from raping her at the Battle of Blackwater, again because she was so "birdlike" and innocent. Littlefinger's obsession with Sansa is the reason why she's still alive, and doesn't have her neck decorating a pike for Joffrey's murder. Or Sky-Flying from the Vale. Or if you take the show as "canon", currently enjoying Ramsay's husbandly attentions to her. The show changed Tyrion because of Dinklage's gravitas so even though we don't get to see the perverseness of him fondling her boobs on TV, he still refuses to have sex with her, despite the pressure from his family to get her pregnant and his own ambitions to be Lord of Winterfell. Heck, Tyrion didn't even let Precious Speshul Sansa to have a Bedding. As she herself declared in the last episode, no man has ever rescued Daenerys Targaryen from a situation that she hadn't first bargained, fought, clawed herself out or literally set herself on fire to prevail over.

I don't think Jon ever felt entitled to his titles. Jon is not a noble, which was @anamika's point. Because Jon cannot claim power by right of bloodline, again because he's bastard-born. I really hope GRRM writes a better ending for Stannis in the books.

I think the problem is that TV these days is so obsessed with being Clever! Apparently, there’s this thinking, which I don’t agree with but the showrunners certainly seem to have bought it, that if a story is Predictable, then it’s failed. If the audience aren’t completely blown away by a TWEEEEST, even if on reflection that twist makes absolute no narrative sense other than the fact that it’s UNPredictable – then they won’t enjoy the story. Here’s a little known truth – tropes and clichés become tropes and clichés because they work. The story about the underdog character winning some one-in-a-million victory and becomes a lauded hero? The lost prince/Arthur/FisherKing-esque character returns to Camelot, heals the land and gets crowned? Think everything from Arthur himself to Prince Zuko. The bad guy is winning, all hope is lost, our heroes are despairing, then the Calvary arrives and turns the tide? Who else didn’t go ‘fuck yeah’ when the Vale army showed up at the Battle of the bastards? The hard past of story-telling isn’t conjuring an impossible twist that no one could have seen coming from a mile away (because he literally pulled it out of his a$$ at the last minute), it’s getting viewers so invested in the characters’s journeys, invested in the story, so rooting for that Predictable end, that when it comes, everyone (mostly) gives that collective ‘Fuck Yeah!’ GRRM got me invested in the Fire & Blood romance between Jon and Dany, regards of puritanical views on their relationship. He's already done the hard part. The easy part now is delivering the 'Fuck yeah!' moment to their story.

And as I just wrote something similar to this on another thread, I'd like to make a point about the inherent misogyny of labeling women crazy/mad/hysterical when they react or behave the same way that men are usually praised or at least "understood" for.

That's my point. Jon, a man, gets to have his deeds define his character (and the ones that don't match how people prefer to see him will be excused away) while Dany, a woman, is defined first by her blood and her deeds are judged through that filter. The fact that it's actually consistent with how real life works - cough-recent-events-cough - doesn't make it any less misogynistic or frustrating.

The point of asking nobles (not smallfolk, which is what Viserys was told and what Dany was referring to) to come and bend the knee is because you understand that they don't welcome you. Aegon the Conqueror did the same thing and he wasn't imagining that the 7 Kings of Westeros at the time would welcome him. He was throwing down the gauntlet. He declared himself King - Told everyone else to kneel and when they didn't, he roasted them with his dragons. When men are aggressive, it's regarded as bad-ass but when a woman is, she's insane. I think it's been argued already whether or not Jon has a better claim that Dany's, by Westerosi precedent so I won't touch that.

I think I understand now. Any "criticism" of Dany, real or perceived, must be met with criticism designed to take out another character. No, you don't understand. I meant that as much as people in the show worry about Dany being the Mad King's Daughter, I hope when the time comes (and Jon's parentage will be revealed), they will be as worried about Jon being the Mad King's Grandson. Obviously the audience already knows that Jon is the grandson of the Mad King. (And yes, I am aware that this is not brought up as often as Dany's parentage. The reasons are so obvious to me that I'm not even going to bother debating them). I tidily snipped out the rest of your comments because I obviously had nothing to say to or about them. She punished the Masters who decided to crucify the children as a warning to her. So she was punishing those that were responsible for that action. That some of the Masters voted against it doesn't absolve them of the decision. That's like arguing that a certain President isn't your President because you didn't vote for him or that you're not responsible for, or benefit from the society he governs. (Much as I'd like to say that). To be blunt, I don't think Dany crucifying every single slaver and noble in Mereen would have been going too far. And I think the show ultimately proves that right - that she didn't go far enough. Anyway, I don't care for the slavery apologia of that season and this discussion so I'm bowing out now.

Regardless of how Hizdahr's dad voted (and we only have his own word on this, there's nothing in the books that supports this), he was ultimately responsible for the final decision because he was a member of the governing board of a slave system. He profited from it, and he was raised on it. Just because he had lines that he didn't cross doesn't mean that he wasn't OK with living in a society where people were routinely bought, sold and tortured worse than animals. Although on a "meta" note, it's interesting that the show tried to paint this "slavery is not black-and-white" picture with Hizdahr's saintly father, and the old slave man that missed his little masters and was so eager to re-sell himself into slavery. It's almost as if D & D were gathering material for their new Confederacy show as far back as then. If anything, a politically astute Sansa would be the one to propose an arranged marriage for herself. She'd understand, or she should understand better than Dany or Jon which unions are more strategic. She'd be involved because she'd want to make sure that she gets not only a partner she can tolerate, but also the best possible alliance for the North. If Dany does end up as Queen of the 7 Kingdoms with Jon as her husband, Sansa more than anyone should understand how important it is to use that connection to the crown to strengthen the House of Stark. Her entire tragedy was based on her being the heir apparent of a powerful house but not having any actual power of her own, therefore making her a pawn. I think it's that scar on his cheek that makes it look like he's perpetually crying. :) He looked miserable even when he was executing Jonas. I just hope when the time comes, people will remember that Jon is the "grandson of the Mad King".

You were responding to a statement I made about Dany being called mad for punishing the Masters in the same way that Sansa punished Ramsay: If you weren't indicting Dany, then what were you implying? There is no difference. Dany also has PTSD from living her entire life looking over her shoulder, being sold as a slave to the Dothraki and being raped for the first months of her marriage. She was mentally and physically tortured in a similar way to Sansa. So it's understandable that she has a berserk!button where slavery is concerned. Terrorism and brutality are basically what makes slavery work. As I said, I don't condemn or even disapprove of Sansa killing Ramsay. But if we're going to apply Geneva Conventions to Dany's actions, then we should extend the same to every character on the show. We can't at the same time be expected to go "hell yeah!" when a man is fed alive to wild dogs, but wring her hands in horror when the masters of a slave system are crucified the same way they just did to 60+ children. Either we accept that this is a brutal society, being led by traumatised children (Sansa and Dany) who are as much about vengeance as justice, or we condemn everyone in the same way.

Certainly not I. (See my edited post). But I don't see how Sansa feeling rage at her abuser is considered more valid than Dany feeling rage at the abusers and murderers of innocent children. Dany never stands on a throne dictating to her Council. She was standing with the rest of her allies in the war room and listening. The only person sitting in that room was Olenna and when Dany wanted to talk to her one-on-one, she sat beside her. And we see her do this all the time when she's taking council. When she's "ruling" over her subjects, she seats on her throne as is appropriate. There's actually a consistent theme of Dany bypassing thrones - from her vision in season 2, to her arrival at Dragonstone - to get down to the business of the day. This is not the first time that aspects of Dany that are clearly shown are overlooked or replaced with something contrary.

So? Wasn't the argument against Dany's crucifixion of the masters in retaliation for their crucifixion of the slaves was that she was "no better" and unusually cruel adn vindictive for murder and mutilation? The same applies or should apply to Sansa. And for the record, I think Sansa's execution of Ramsay was a "Fuck yeah!" moment. The bastard deserved it. I just don't understand how one woman gets glorified for the same action that another woman is considered insane for doing.