arjumand

Hey you! Thanks for the rec! I finished Lost in Purgatory, finally (that last chapter almost drove me insane). Man, the show pissed me off this season re. flashbacks - I spent ages wondering about the tattoo Constantine gave him, what does it meaaaaaaaan, will it be too different when I come up with my own take on it and so on. Turns out, on the show it means nothing at all. It glows. Whooo. Now that the season is over I can finally continue an AU Season 4 fic I started though I've kinda been seduced by another show, recently (mumblemumbleWinteriscomingheremumble). Still, I have plans for the story, so it's not going to be abandoned! (There - now that I've said it, it must be true!) Macha is so amazing, and seems to pull everything out of her hat so effortlessly, but she must really work hard on it - her work is so well-characterized - I'm reading the unbearable hotness of being right now, and it's hilarious in a way that's not OOC at all.

I snipped most of the post but agree with every word - excellent analysis and very well put. The things I bolded - you're a 100% right. Littlefinger being outmaneuvered, LF predicting wrongly, those things are what gave me hope for future Sansa, and is making me ignore all the BTS bullshit. The fact is, LF was wrong. He doesn't fit in the North, he doesn't understand them, and Sansa has to see that. She has to see that he never once asked her what she wanted, what her dreams and desires were. It's all about him, and what he wants, while Jon only ever wants to give her stuff. I think that Sansa, having spent so much time in the South, and at court, never really understood how traumatic the Red Wedding actually was to the North. Frey and Karstark and Bolton betrayed their king and broke guest right and tore the North apart, but all that Sansa saw (and you can't really blame her) was the deaths of her mother and brother. That's why Lyanna Mormont brought it up, and Manderley directly referenced it - in a kind of 'we've been using that as an excuse, and now we can't, he's fixed it.' Lyanna Mormont drops the mic. I agree with all you've said about Jon, too. It seems to me that the whole issue with the Wildlings and betraying Jon because of them comes from a misunderstanding of what the Night's Watch and the Wall are actually for, and what the North Remembers actually means. Just like Winter is Coming has nothing to do with the weather- well, partly, maybe. It was all about the Others and the Night's King. Only, the North, heh, forgot. Yes, absolutely yes to everything. Also, re. Jon's mistakes. You are absolutely right. To play devil's advocate, let's say he held back when his youngest brother, a child, was hunted like an animal, in front of him. And maybe he went ahead with the plan. He would have won that battle, but he would have lost the war for people's souls, to be a bit mushy about it. No way would Lyanna Mormont be acclaiming that guy to be King in the North, and no way would the other lords be following suit. And that scene made me realise that he's going to have to be King in the North to unite the North and fight the Night's King, because as his experience with the Night's Watch showed him, reasoned argument isn't going to work (ironically, it worked with part of the wildlings at Hardhome, but it didn't work with so-called civilized men). No, they weren't going to acclaim Sansa or follow her - she needs to make herself a true Northerner again before that happens.

Yeah, I tend to see Dany's words to Daario as a way of letting him down easy, because you can't take the Second Sons to Westeros for other reasons (I actually wish she'd left the Dothraki behind, too). Re. marrying Jaime, or any Lannister: no. Jaime killed her daddy and Jaime's father tried to kill her and her brother countless times. And his redemption is still arguable - it all depends how he's going to react to Cersei's clusterfuck next season. Also, she's had direct experience of how a marriage to secure a city / kingdom goes - when she married that Mereen guy it helped not at all. And she got herself out of the Dosh Khaleen and the risk of Dothraki gangbang by herself, with no husband, and not even any dragons. I think she's gonna like the feeling of doing things on her own, and she believes the prophecy that she will never any more children. She's going to take over first, worry about the succession later.

So, in the middle of a very clickbaity and spoilery article 10 facts about Jon Snow's father Spoiler McSpoiler (forgot to say - the article has AUTOPLAY of the relevant scene from the episode) we have an artist's impression of aforementioned spoiler.

Man, that whole Young Griff business is driving me insane. I hadn't read the books cover to cover, because there's characters I don't care about, so I read the epilogue to Dance with Dragons, and Varys is going on about Aegon, and I'm like WHAT. If anyone ever analyses google searches for the lolz, they're gonna have a good old giggle when they read my "why is Varys talking about Aegon like he's still alive?". No wonder D&D left him out - it just makes the whole thing immeasurably more complicated. I mean, whoever Young Griff is, he clearly thinks he's Aegon Targaryen. I prefer show Varys, tbh - not that I mind Qyburn getting all those kids to kill Pycelle. Having just read the Sansa chapters when she's trying to survive after Ned's arrested, he is such a fucking asshole. She's a child, and he's trying to get her killed. Good riddance, Pycelle. Thing is, even though Stannis is still alive in the books, the story at the end of ADWD is headed towards the 'we're dying, the horses are dying, let's burn people'. I thought Brienne was caught and almost hanged by LSH - and I am so glad that bitch isn't in the show - and seems to have agreed to lead Jaime into LSH's trap rather than watch Podrick hang. I can't express how much I hate this storyline for Brienne in the books - at least on the show she partly succeeds in her quest. In the books she just wanders around aimlessly (though I cheered when she killed some of the Bloody Mummers - wait, that was them, right?), then goes in the wrong direction and gets scooped up by Catelyn Stark 2.0 (new House motto: I ruin everything). I don't even want to get into the Dorne guys who go to Mereen to try and get Dany to marry some Martell kid, who's refused by Dany and burninated by Rhaegal when he tries to make friends with Viserion (dude!). I mean, what was the freaking point, here? Finally, this season (and Hardhome last season) has made leaps and bounds into the White Walkers + Night's King story, which also has to be resolved. I know that for a lot of people the politicking is what's important in GoT, and it's why I never got into the show (until recently, because Hardhome wins everything), because I don't care about that stuff. However, both the show and the books start with the Night's Watch facing the White Walkers / Others and their ice zombies wights. To me it always seemed like a hint that none of the politics mattered in the long run, because Winter is Coming Here, and the Others don't care which House you belong to. But either GRRM got bored with that, or he's saving all of it for the Winds of Winter, whenever it comes out, because it seriously seems to have stalled in the books. I mean, there are some things I like better in the books - for example, it's Arya who kills the Tickler, and I love the way she stabs him while asking the questions he used to interrogate people with. But the show at least has forward momentum - at the moment the books feel like Brienne wandering around, thinking she's following a lead, realising it's false, follows another, realises it's a trap once it's sprung, etc.

The thing is, when Jaime gave that comment about Cersei still chasing Sansa for Tyrion's murder, I saw it more of an out for him with Brienne, or even trying to talk himself out of the logical thing to do, which would have been give up King's Landing and all within it as a lost cause. At the time he was speaking, Cersei had no power to do anything at all - she couldn't even stand next to her son, the King. I see the Sansa problem as being very much 'out of sight, out of mind' for Cersei. Or we'll see in the season 7 opener - depending on her reaction when she's told that the Riverlands are either up for grabs or under Tully rule, and that the Boltons are toast and the North is in revolt, but, strangely enough, not interested in marching on King's Landing or whatever. If she really wanted to be a real Queen rather than getting revenge on everything, she'd try to solve the little problem of who's controlling the Reach now that she's wiped out the Tyrells. And where are the King's Landing people going to get their food. I fully expect Cersei and Jaime's first meeting to involve Cersei monologuing about her great revenge, and Jaime listening, with an enigmatic expression on his face. I mean, has he ever told her why he killed King Aerys? If she knows about that, she'll be going after him first.

I just realized the why of the man bun (still NOT SURE IF WANT, though). Mel gave him a haircut (damn you, Red Woman!), and in fact when he executes Olly and co., you can see that it's shorter. But then, it must have grown back during filming, except that in show time, only a few days had passed, so he has to pull it back to hide that fact. I mean, he still looks good, but I miss the curls. On a less shallow level - I really, really want Jon to get everything he wants (yes to the love scene!) I love the way he and Sansa found each other after life tried to break them, and that they're back home again.

I like all this - also, I've been thinking. Surely not all the Umber and Bolton forces were killed in the battle, right? Send them to the Wall. They can't be trusted around Winterfell - let them fortify those abandoned castles along the Wall, or Castle Black itself. Re. the Cersei issue - rather than sending Jaime North to get Sansa, I was thinking she might send him back to the Riverlands. Cersei: "So, did you not notice that Walder Frey's throat was cut and his sons were pies, or what?" Jaime: "Everyone was obnoxiously fine when I left them!" Sending Jaime North would directly contradict that conversation she had with Joffrey when she said that as a Southerner, it was impossible for him to control the North, to let the Kings wipe each other out etc. I don't remember the exact wording. OTOH, if she wants to get rid of Jaime, that's exactly what she might do. Maybe that would be the day Jaime gets his eyes opened about how evil she really is. Or not.

Absolutely - TBH, I never saw what would make the assembled lords acclaim Sansa as Queen in the North. Lady Mormont is the exception in the Northern houses, not the rule, and only because the Mormonts have a tradition of female warriors (Maege, Dacy). We see how when they went to negotiate, Sansa completely miscalculated the approach, and it was left to kind old Uncle Davos to win her over. Not that I blame Sansa - her last few years haven't equipped her very well in dealing with people like Lyanna. To be honest, I didn't like Lyanna that much when she was being the Lady of Sick Burns with Sansa - poor Sansa has spend the last few years being valued only for her working uterus and virginity, and she managed to survive King's fucking Landing during the reign of King Justin Bieber (Honest Trailers calls him that and I love it). That's more than others managed, and she should really get some credit for it. Re. the first cousins bit - wasn't Sansa supposed to marry Robin Arryn, but then his mother died before she could make it happen? That's another first cousin marriage - the only reason anyone was against it was that Robin's a kid and a weirdo, not because their mothers were sisters. It may seem wrong to us, but in Westeros it seems to be fine. This, a million times. I'm full of hope because of two things - the dismissive way she says "a pretty picture", as in 'now who's living in a dream world, Lord Baelish?' and that way she stops him from kissing her. I've watched that scene a million times, it's so beautiful: Petyr Baelish moves in for a kiss. Sansa: HARD PASS. Yes, she listens to him - because at this point he still thinks he has a chance, and he's going to let something important slip one day. OT: Petyr Baelish is just that guy, right - the one who sees a woman wanting to be alone, doing something which doesn't involve him, and just has to interrupt, because what women do without men is not important. Blech.

This isn't my idea, I found it in a yt video but I feel it isn't about following the name, but the man. when Jon and company tried to get support, all the North knew was that they went down this path before and lost. After the battle, OTOH, everyone who survived told the same story - about this maniac warrior who charged into battle and survived and won. IMO, the Red Wedding is still incredibly powerful here - the fact that it was referenced, more than once, is the hint. They were betrayed and slaughtered. It doesn't matter that so many of Jons men died during the battle - they died fighting, they weren't slaughtered while they were defenseless. look at Lord Glover - he's asking for forgiveness for not coming to a battle where he and his men could have been wiped out! Of course it's Lady Mormont who has to start that speech - she, with her 62 men, was the only one who came.

That's why I'm hoping he won't have any influence over her next season - that she'll just pretend to listen so that he'll keep trusting her. It's not really a question of being politically astute, in my opinion - this isn't something she has to plan out like a chess game. It just requires a memory of a direct succession of events, one after the other: she trusts Petyr, and the next thing she knows, she's being bent over a bed while her brutalized eunuch foster-brother watches. Even if she believes that Petyr didn't know how bad Ramsey was (and I can hardly believe it myself, even though the showrunners said it), that's even worse: he didn't care enough about her safety to investigate the guy who was going to have complete power over her. Petyr treated her like one of his whores, and I think that was one of the reasons part of Jeyne Poole's story was given to Sansa instead. Talking to Baelish at Molestown, it seemed like Sansa realised this. Talking to Jon at Winterfell, it was made very clear that Sansa realised this, and that she was talking partly about herself when she said "Only a fool would trust Littlefinger." In fact, in the scene in the godswood she calls herself a "stupid girl". So, in my opinion, going back on that and trusting Littlefinger again would be counterproductive as regards character development.

I doubt that the showrunners / GRRM are going to do that idea twice - I see the whole 'Jon is a Targaryen' and now he's at Winterfell with Sansa storyline as leading to a reconciliation between the two families, a joining of that initial rift of Torrhen Stark being the 'King who knelt'. At the time, there couldn't be a marriage treaty as the Targaryens were still in the business of marrying their siblings, and probably considered marrying outside the family beneath them. Now, however, it could happen. Also, Aegon the Conqueror didn't have White Walkers and the Night King to contend with. It's interesting that the showrunners talked about the Night King being analogous to Death - that seems to imply he can't be defeated. I saw a yt video suggesting that the series will end with a reconciliation / treaty between humans and the Night King / White Walkers rather than a final battle. But the show's White Walkers have never even been shown speaking - how would that work?

Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter ( H. Simpson). What I bolded - wouldn't it be supremely, deliciously ironic, if after spending his entire life learning to play the Game so well that he thinks he can get on the Iron Throne (yeah right - a brothel-keeper. sure dude), that he's killed by a White Walker, or even more insulting, a wight? He's based his whole existence on the supreme importance of politics, he's used people, murdered people, destroyed entire families to get where he is, and he's swept aside like an irritating gnat by something he doesn't even believe in.

I actually watched the scene again, this time paying close attention to Sansa instead of looking at Jon, whose stunned 'the fuck is going on right now? Am I being punk'd?' face is particularly adorable. And you're right - Sansa is smiling throughout. She doesn't say a word, just smiles, even when Jon looks at her in a sort of pleading way. And you're exactly right as to when she stops - she catches Littlefinger's eye, and that's when the smile turns to OH SHIT. Oh shit, this guy just told me his entire game plan, and now he's regretting it. I would like Lyanna/Rhaegar flashbacks, but I doubt that's gonna happen, if only for the problem of who are you going to cast as the most handsome prince who ever handsomed, with long white-blond hair and purple eyes (seriously GRRM? No wonder people call the Targaryens the Mary Sues of asoiaf)? At least in our imagination he can be amazing. Like LotR Legolas (not The Hobbit Legolas - Peter Jackson did some weird CGI to Orlando Bloom's face in that).

I didn't get that at all from the first viewing of the episode, and what with BTS comments from the actors etc, I thought I'd watched it wrong. So I went to the scene again, and no, I got it right first time. Sansa is smiling a small smile all the way through the King in the North scene, and at no point does she suggest by her body language that she thinks it's hers by right. The only time she stops smiling is when she catches LFs eye and sees that he isn't pleased. That look on her face - that's worry, not resentment. Because LF has just showed his hand with her, big time. He told her about his future plans, and told her what he thought would happen. And he was wrong. Also, I'm supposed to believe the actors and the showrunners, the ones who spent a whole year trying to convince everyone of the deadness of Jon Snow? I don't think so. We're being told about the coming Jon/Sansa conflict because they believe that there has to be conflict everywhere! to get audiences back. Sansa wanted her home back - she got it. She wanted Ramsey dead - she got that too. The only thing she's worried about now is LF and his machinations - I don't think the Night King is really real to her right now, no matter what Jon told her. Once she finds out how LF's plots managed to destroy her family, it'll be his turn to face Stark justice. And there'll be no riding south for him.

Thoros of Myr is the priest of R'hllor who's with the Brotherhood without Banners and who resurrected Beric. Not so sure what he did to her. Arya met the Red Woman when she (Mel) took Gendry away - for all Arya knows, Gendry's dead. ETA: In that conversation when Davos accused Melisandre, for a second I thought she was going to say that Shireen's death was the sacrifice needed to resurrect Jon. Even though I hate her, I just thought "Do NOT go there, girl. Nuh uh. Then Jon really will kill you."

Exactly (bolded part)! I must admit to being really oblivious then, because in the KitN scene I didn't get any 'Sansa is pissed off vibes', only that she was worried when she spotted Littlefinger greasily sleazing away in the corner. She now knows what he really wants (the Iron Throne + her as bonus) and she really doesn't want it, IMO. Re. the behind the scenes actors' and showrunners' comments - eh. I'm taking all those with several handfuls of salt. I seem to remember being told for a year that Jon Snow was dead, the deadest, so very dead. Until he wasn't. And the whole scene with LF was him telling her, if you think you'll be safe with your half-brother, think again - there's no way everyone will rally behind him. He never for a second suggests that she should rally them behind her, he just says that she can be Queen, sure, but by his side, not in her own right. Also, talking to Jon, when she says "Anyone who trusts LF is a fool" she was really talking about herself - she's the one who trusted LF, and he treated her like he treats all women: property to be bought and sold. So I don't see her ever trusting him again. Maybe she'll pretend to trust him, until he's fooled enough for her or Arya to stab him - he'd never see it coming. Yes, if that scene was really meant to show Sansa's frustration at everyone declaring for Jon, then I'm annoyed too. I'm going to choose to interpret it as the actors not being told the whole plan / interpreting their characters' actions through a contemporary viewpoint. One last thing: if Sansa wanted them all to declare for her, why didn't she say that to Jon? He gave her every chance to say: "Thanks for everything, half-brother, I'll take it from here." Or why didn't she give the big speech instead of Lyanna Mormont? She was even more justified than Lyanna (who I love now, unconditionally) in chastising the Glovers, Manderleys and the Cerwyns for being Sers NotComingtotheBattle. One last, last thing - people are speculating about what will happen if Jon's parentage is finally known by the lords in the North (I'm hoping for a long-lasting scroll hidden in Lyanna Stark's crypt at Winterfell), and how they'll react to having declared a half-Targaryen King in the North. Well, as we were told in the finale, the best alliances are made by marriage. And there's Ned's girl in Winterfell at last. So, she can be Queen in the North. Tee hee.

Yeah, whatever. I must have missed the scenes in which she flays people while they're alive hunts women with a bow and dogs tortures someone for months and cuts off his penis kills her own father with a knife between the ribs kills a newborn baby with aforementioned dogs keeps threatening people with aforementioned dogs rapes and tortures someone for an indeterminate time. I've seen posts on tumblr in which rape survivors were almost ashamed of admitting they shared that little smile Sansa gave when she was walking away - that feeling of utter relief that she'll never be hurt by him, ever again. That they shared the desire to destroy their own rapist and abuser the way Sansa did hers. Also, what happened to Ramsey wasn't the Stark way? I'm sorry, but I don't get it: She passed sentence on him ("you will disappear"), she gave him the opportunity to say his last words ("I will always be a part of you"), which were the classic abuser words, and then his own tools were . . . put in the same room with him. She at first was going to turn away, but then she faced him, the man she sentenced to die ("Don't look away. Father will know if you do.") And the little smile was while she was walking away. No-one saw it. She didn't even show Ramsey, the monster, who did all his crimes while grinning, laughing at the people he was destroying, not even allowing them some dignity at the end. No, she gave him his dignity, the man who raped her with an audience. She didn't turn him into a joke, which he really was, at the end, having created the means of his own destruction. She saved her relief and satisfaction for herself (and us). Is she not allowed to feel relieved that this man who tried to destroy her is finally gone, and won't hurt her or anyone else ever again? Absolutely, nksarmi; now I too want an "I will survive" edit - maybe a fanvid.

I like that idea - I've been getting kinda annoyed at the GoT Academy guys over on youtube for their obsession with their Sansa=Elizabeth I theory, because it just doesn't fit. The only reason Elizabeth I became queen was that of Henry VIII's kids, she was the only one left - she was entitled to the crown because she was directly related to the king - what's Sansa's 'credentials' at this point? And does she even want it? Danaerys is the only living child of the last Targaryen king - Jon would be the heir if he were legitimate (if R+L=J), but he isn't, so it's a moot point, as far as the Iron Throne is concerned. If he wanted it, because he doesn't. Where I agree with them is that Jon is some kind of legendary warrior figure, whether it's Azor Ahai or the Prince that was Promised,* because otherwise I can't see a reason for him surviving that insane long shot cavalry charge followed by battle and near suffocation. There were arrows hitting all around him, cavalry headed straight for him was being stopped by others in the nick of time, and that's besides the guys he smashed through on his own. And it's not enough to say that it's tv show magic - everything in a tv show is there for a reason. *then they go and piss me off again by saying that Jon wants to die - no he doesn't, not anymore, not after he was buried alive and had to practically dig himself out of his own grave. Fuck's sake.

The difference between your example and what happened to Sansa on the show is telling - it happened to Sansa, not her family. Yes, Ramsey killed her little brother, but, interestingly, she wasn't there when it happened, it was a deliberate choice by the writer of the episode not to put her there. Her revenge was solely over what happened to her, personally, because rape is both personal and deliberate. Ramsey chose to violate her when he could have won her over and made her his willing slave: like most sociopaths, he could act very charming when he wanted, and he even had a mistress, Myranda, who wasn't the type to put up with his bullshit. So he must have had some game. Instead he chose to violate her in front of an unwilling audience, in ways that were both painful and humiliating, and he kept doing it, over and over, until she had to get away from him or die in the attempt. Don't equate Sansa with someone whose family members or loved ones have been killed - what Ramsey did, he did to her, and her only. In a way, Sansa right now strikes me as Jon strikes me - Jon died and was brought back, and for a while felt only half alive, being reborn clawing his way out of that pile of bodies. Sansa was destroyed by Ramsey, and revenge in kind was the only thing which she felt would bring her back. Sure, she smiled. I would have. It's interesting that the show chose to include the scene in the crypt at Winterfell, where Robert complains that Lyanna is buried in such a gloomy place. Ned is quite sharp with Robert there: "She was my sister." It just goes to show how essentially stupid and oblivious Robert was, that he didn't hear it. Also, the assassins after Dany fight was really Ned having had enough - in the books, Dany is even younger than on the show, and you get the impression that Ned has had enough of his 'great friend' Robert murdering children. Which is why he makes the biggest mistake of his life and warns Cersei that he's on to her. I often blame Ned for leaving Winterfell and politicking in King's Landing, but seriously, could he have refused? Robert wasn't one of those kings who took 'no' for an answer.

Just saw this on io9 (c)Bingostar Also, I like the idea that Jon is experiencing a rebirth in that scene - some critics have been saying that Jon seems so different after he was brought back to life by Melisandre, like he has a death wish. But that struggle to get air, that was him choosing life again. I rewatched the episode and that whole part is unbelievable. I found myself dreading it even as I acknowledged it was skilfully done - this is war, this is what Jon is tired of, and you can't really blame him. Visually, this whole episode is out of this world - the scene where Dany and Yara talk, there's some shots which could be a Flemish painting. Wow.

I agree, completely. Jon did what any person with actual emotions would do, which is why Ramsey decided to use them against him. As usual, though, he went overboard, and overplayed his hand, making what happened to him (i.e. Ramsey) inevitable. Just like his father had told him re. Sansa and Theon, he played his games with Rickon and lost, by ensuring that he would not survive the aftermath of the battle. I mean, no one was going to give Ramsey the option of taking the black. If it hadn't been his dogs, it would have been Jon's sword.

It struck me that there's a reason Davos had to find out about Shireen during this episode in particular, rather than at any point in season 6: because the audience had to be reminded of Shireen and the choices Stannis made, because Jon is going to make exactly the opposite choice. Stannis chose to sacrifice his family to get what he wanted, and lost everything. Jon refuses to sacrifice his family, even if it's to gain a crucial advantage, and he wins. It couldn't have gone any other way. Even if we're talking about it in meta terms, there's no way you can have the hero of a tv show sit on his horse, stone-faced, while the villain uses his little brother for target practice. No way. I personally don't believe Sansa will be 'punished' in the show for what she did to Ramsey - first of all, it has that karmic death which many bad guys get in GoT: he used his dogs to murder people - gets killed by his dogs. Also, in a way, he killed himself, as Sansa pointed out. These were his loyal pets, who'd been his companions forever. Except he starved them for a week. If he hadn't, they wouldn't have killed him. He didn't have to do that - he's trained them to do his bidding. He was just being his usual, over-grandiose mustache-twirling villain self, and it's finally backfired.

I also liked what was hinted by (was it Tyrion or Dany? I have no time to rewatch RN) saying what happens if each of the 7 kingdoms want to break off, which kind of brought out a 'why not?', IMO. I mean, it's only a couple of centuries ago that Aegon yoked everyone together whether they wanted to or not. Maybe Danaerys can be a different kind of ruler - we've already had the example of what happens when you put all your eggs in the absolute king of everything basket, and that suddenly disappears. Last thing, before I really have to go offline and do some work - that scene in the promo with LF and Sansa in the godswood: you know what he wants, Sansa! Don't fucking give it to him!

The bold is the only thing I disagreed with - not the Sansa part, the Jon part. IMO, Jon is exactly in the wrong frame of mind not to be affected by Ramsey's mind games - he's suffering a massive case of PTSD resulting from 1. Hardhome (which I know is a year ago for us, but was like yesterday for Jon) and 2. His complete and utter betrayal by his brothers of the Night's Watch. And even then, the attacks were pretty straightforward. With Ramsey, he was playing directly on Jon's need for family and need to belong. Because Ramsey was Jon, growing up as a bastard - not having any emotions himself, he knows how people with emotions will react, and which buttons to push. Now Sansa, her only fault in this episode, IMO, was that she wasn't explicit and detailed enough about what Ramsey does. Jon is a very straightforward kind of guy - you need to give him more than vague "I know him" utterances. I appreciate that she tried, but she wasn't explicit enough. Like at the end of their conversation, when she said she was never going back to Ramsey, and he said he'd protect her. That's two people speaking at cross-purposes here. What she means is: "I need someone to kill me before Ramsey gets his hands on me again." So when your brother (hem hem) clearly doesn't understand what you mean is not the time to flounce off with a dramatic "No-one can protect me". Though Jon was the wrong person to ask, if he couldn't even imagine that Rickon was doomed. Which is why I'm kinda pissed that Brienne wasn't there, though I know it made no sense (unless she borrowed LF's jetpack) - she'd be the one to ask. This episode was nerve-wracking. I can't watch it in real-time, being in the wrong timezone, so I freely admit I skipped to the end at one point (when it looked like Jon was going to be crushed under the weight of the dead), because I couldn't take the tension.