S08.E05: The Bells

[One Tough Cookie]

2 hours ago, GodsBeloved said:

Crazy, demented, evil, insane, wicked, immoral, mad. He was all that and more.

But pretty easy on the eyes!

Th Tarlys? F'em.  They were mean to Sam.

[AnnaL]

22 hours ago, UNOSEZ said:

I preferred this happening to maybe an episode or two of "Dany going mad" I didn't need or want to have the breadcrumbs more laid out than they already were.. Besides seeing her slowly become more paranoid and demanding.. And having everyone look at her side eyes would just had ppl calling "character assassination" sooner.. I liked that up until the bells I wasn't sure what was gonna happen.. Up until then there was still a chance that she could've flown to the keep and offed Cersei and what not... She had a choice... She chose fear.. And im intrigued to see how she rationalized it next week... 

I can almost picture it right now, she will give her big speech , introduce herself with all her titles , proceed to ignore the massacre or if she has to acknowledge it she will say,

"Sansa Stark has blood in her hands, she made me do it, but don't worry my beloved citizens, I am your beloved Queen and I will make her pay with Fire and Blood, I will avenge you" 

Or some sort of delusional speech. Everyone around will be looking at the floor because what else can you do when you have a monster with no moral or values who have just killed thousands of innocent people and is talking like this was her destiny all along? 

You would have to be out of your mind or a wish to die to even pretend to reason with her, fear is what she wanted and fear is what she will have. She no longer has advisors, she has subjects now. I know if I was a survivor of KL I would just clap and pretend to smile. I mean at this point the few surviving people are terrified out of their minds and that is exactly what Daenerys wanted.

A new kingdom where her word is the last word. A new kingdom where if you look at her sideways you become a snack for her dragon. 

[Bryce Lynch]

4 minutes ago, Drogo said:

Sometimes you have to take advice from people who...

• Never led you astray and always had your back
• May or may not be dead
• Never tried to poison your meals
• Never told your business to people nicknamed The Spider
• Aren't Lannisters
• Don't dry-heave after kissing you

ex:

Daario:  "Use your fucking dragons."

Jorah:  "Do what you have to do to win/survive.  Honorable people die all the damn time."

Olenna:  "♪We don't need no water, let this motherfucker burn♫"

Drogo:  "Kill everyone, destroy everythingggg, fuck em if they can't take a joke."

Missandei:  "Dracarys, bitches."

I wonder if Missandei's "dracarys", besides being a reaction to Cersei ordering her killed, was a reaction to the bad treatment she and GW had received from the apparently racist people of Westeros.   

[spaceghostess]

1 minute ago, Law Mom said:

I am truly sorry. I wish you all the best, sister.

Thank you. One of the best things about getting away from someone like that is realizing how many really nice people there still are in the world. 🙂

[Bryce Lynch]

4 minutes ago, AnnaL said:

I can almost picture it right now, she will give her big speech , introduce herself with all her titles , proceed to ignore the massacre or if she has to acknowledge it she will say,

"Sansa Stark has blood in her hands, she made me do it, but don't worry my beloved citizens, I am your beloved Queen and I will make her pay with Fire and Blood, I will avenge you" 

Or some sort of delusional speech. Everyone around will be looking at the floor because what else can you do when you have a monster with no moral or values who have just killed thousands of innocent people and is talking like this was her destiny all along? 

You would have to be out of your mind or a wish to die to even pretend to reason with her, fear is what she wanted and fear is what she will have. She no longer has advisors, she has subjects now. I know if I was a survivor of KL I would just clap and pretend to smile. I mean at this point the few surviving people are terrified out of their minds and that is exactly what Daenerys wanted.

A new kingdom where her word is the last word. A new kingdom where if you look at her sideways you become a snack for her dragon. 

If Dany kills Sansa, I might be willing to forgive her killing those thousands of innocents.   But, the writers seem to love their "smartest woman in Westeros".   

Edited May 14, 2019 by Bryce Lynch

[tv-talk]

4 minutes ago, Lady S. said:

Dany's only had a full Dothraki horde since s6 and they never sacked any cities for her before this, the most we saw was them killing the Harpies outside the gates of Meereen. The advantage of the Unsullied is supposed to be that they don't go on rampages of their own accord and they had specific orders about who to kill in Astapor. Dany's been threatening to destroy cities since s2 but she's never actually done so until now. 

Ok I didnt do a rewatch or a reread so am fuzzy...didnt Dany conquer the cities of Slaver's Bay? Sure they may not have shown it on-screen, but what were we led to believe happened when these cities were defeated?

[Constantinople]

I'm in the camp that feels Cersei's death was anti-climatic.

On the bright side, she died with a horrible haircut

[Dame sans merci]

4 minutes ago, Constantinople said:

I'm in the camp that feels Cersei's death was anti-climatic.

On the bright side, she died with a horrible haircut

Weirdly, she and Jaime died with...the same hair-cut?

But it was definitely underwhelming. Given how they've built Cersei up over the seasons to an insane degree, to have her go out with such a whimper was deeply puzzling. 

Edited May 14, 2019 by Dame sans merci

[byrd]

On ‎5‎/‎12‎/‎2019 at 9:23 PM, Neurochick said:

I liked it, I think.  What was the last word last week?  Dracarus.  Yep, that happened.

Dani basically saw two of her children killed right in front of her.  Fuck everything.

I think she went a little insane there for a moment.. she left nothing , she roasted the whole dam kingdom and everything in it. I wanted Cersei to suffer a long painful death. I wanted Dany to punish her and cut her head off.  I wanted Cersi to actually witness Dany take the throne. Cersi death was to dam easy for me. Oh well., maybe she'll suffer more when she arrives in hell. lol !!! Well there aren't that many characters left to kill off now.  

On ‎5‎/‎12‎/‎2019 at 9:29 PM, Neurochick said:

I loved the episode because in reality people don’t act the way you want them to.  

I’ve worked with people who’ve done 180s because bad shit happened to them, so I know it happens in real life, so this episode didn’t bother me at all.

I am curious for all who hated it, what would you have preferred?

Dany take the throne.

[Bryce Lynch]

12 minutes ago, Constantinople said:

I'm in the camp that feels Cersei's death was anti-climatic.

On the bright side, she died with a horrible haircut

I always liked the way Cersei basically kept the haircut Septa Unella gave her for her walk of atonement.  

[Constantinople]

15 minutes ago, Dame sans merci said:

Weirdly, she and Jaime died with...the same hair-cut?

But it was definitely underwhelming. Given how they've built Cersei up over the seasons to an insane degree, to have her go out with such a whimper was deeply puzzling. 

Her fear of dying was an interesting contrast to the end of the Battle of the Blackwater when she was about to poison herself and Tommen (only for Tywin to ruin everything by showing up to announce the Lannister victory).

But otherwise, it felt flat.

[RealReality]

1 hour ago, Bryce Lynch said:

It is debatable whether the Tarly's were being honorable or prideful and foolish, or both.

The whole matter of whether they owed allegiance to Cersei or House Tyrell was murky.  Cersei was the crowned ruler of the 7Ks, so there oath to the crown would supersede their oath to their liege lady.  But, since Cersei's claim to the throne was rather shaky and she had done it by murdering the Queen, the High Septon and numerous nobles, you could argue that no house owed allegiance to her, especially if their liege lords had declared against her.

Even if you believe the crown belonged to House Baratheon, House Baratheon became extinct when Tommen died and was already really extinct after Stannis was killed.  

Was Cersei's claim to the crown based upon her being the widow of the King she murdered or the mother of the late King who was not a legitimate King, but an incest bastard?  Of course, neither the murder nor the illegitimacy of Tommen were known for sure, which could give Lords grounds to follow Cersei.  

I guess you can give Randyl credit for choosing a side, rather than flipping back and forth like Varys.   But, given how his character was portrayed in his treatment of Sam and him wanting to flog the straggles in the loot train, I tend to think he was just a dick, though a brave one.   

To me, the point isn't in the logic of RTs decision, but, as you said, that he picked a side and stood by it, even in the face of a certain death.  And dickon did the same.

And I don't remember dickon being as big a dick (yeah I went there) as his dad.

The interesting thing...and I'm not sure if the writers were going for it....is that by giving them a gruesome death, Dany  made a relatively minor guy who is essentially a weenie and his son (who was so minor that everyone kept forgetting his name) into martyrs.

And that's an interesting point to me.  That people who kind of suck can be vaulted into the realm of hero or martyr with an overreaction to an act of defiance.  Had Dany simply beheaded them instead of making a spectacle of their deaths no one would have cared and it wouldn't be a big deal to anyone but Sam.

[Drogo]

13 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

I always liked the way Cersei basically kept the haircut Septa Unella gave her for her walk of atonement.  

It's the last haircut she had while she was still a mother. 

[Soup333]

Am I alone in feeling like all four of the remaining Starks surviving (if they do) would feel unsatisfying? Trained assassin, I get it. Warrior, okay fine. But Sansa? She can’t die? Why tho?

[AnnaL]

21 hours ago, Wendy said:

Jon shouldn't have to keep a lid on anything. He has the right to tell whoever he wants, it shouldn't be a secret anymore. Daenerys asking him to keep it a secret just so she could have her claim uncontested is one of the most selfish things I have seen. Tell everybody and have Jon publicly announce his abdication or make him your partner (either by marriage or an alliance) 

Daenerys could have share the news herself in a controlled way but that would have required some level of compromise like give Jon back the North and let him rule it as she rules the other six kingdoms and that is something that Daenerys would never do, compromise, share the power. 

Daenerys has none to blame by herself, she came with a picture in her head that people in Westeros were waiting for her with flowers and parades and when that didn't happen she wasn't able to adjust and use her political strategies, she didn't even care for as long as she had dragons there was no need to negotiate, for as long as she has dragons everybody has to bend the knee or burn. Her dragons, her arrogance, her inability to cope with anything out of the scope of her understanding have been her undoing. 

Danaerys has always been a tyrant but she wanted to portrayed the image of a just queen, well after last night that is no longer possible so she has now decided to remove the mask out of her face and now she is the evil queen. That is not Sansa's fault, that is not Varys, Tyrion, Jon, Cersei's fault. That was a decision carefully considered and consciously made by Daenerys herself. At least now she has revealed herself, there is no more room for her self-serving grandstanding of "saving" Westeros. Someone will have to save Westeros from her. 

Looking back I think this is one of the things that bothers me most. 

Daenerys sitting pretty on the throne after mass murdering the KL's population and the other kingdoms looking at her with fear but also with contempt for what she has done. Everybody resentful of her tyranny and plotting her demise but understanding that she is too powerful with her dragon, her armies and the absolute lack of a conscience to spare any enemy. The other kingdoms are completely and utterly helpless against her. If by some miracle someone (Arya, I am looking at you) manages to kill her, there is still a dragons and armies to take care of, it will be more blood. 

But just like any other tyrant, she will fall sooner or later and her kingdom will be remembered as one of the most tyrannical and bloodiest of Westeros, a cautionary tale if you wish. Who will be remembered as their allies? who will the other kingdoms will remembered as the ones who fought right along her to massacre innocent victims? 

The North, that's right, the Northern soldiers under Jon's command fought to put Daenerys on the throne. Others might have pledge their alliance with her but it was the North who actually send soldiers to her cause. Jon could have avoided this by accepting the terms that Cersei proposed, she still wouldn't have sent soldiers but the North would not have been obligated to help this monster and go in history as their allies in this horrible episode. 

I can't imagine that this the legacy that Ned Stark would have wanted for his house, unfortunately it is done and nothing will reverse that fact. 

[RealReality]

14 hours ago, JennyMominFL said:

We bombed Hiroshima ostensibly to win the war. Many Historians think we dropped the bomb on Nagasaki to prove to the USSR that we had more than one bomb, the opening shot in the Cold War so to speak. Sometimes, its definitely about sending a message.

I hate our actions at Hiroshima and i think history has shown we were on the wrong side there.  However, I don't think anyone had surrendered when we bombed Hiroshima, so, it was an act taken in an active war.

Dany knew those people had surrendered and then undertook burning the women and children.  There was no active conflict.  So to me, the two are different.  

[RealReality]

Just now, AnnaL said:

Looking back I think this is one of the things that bothers me most. 

Daenerys sitting pretty on the throne after mass murdering the KL's population and the other kingdoms looking at her with fear but also with contempt for what she has done. Everybody resentful of her tyranny and plotting her demise but understanding that she is too powerful with her dragon, her armies and the absolute lack of a conscience to spare any enemy. The other kingdoms are completely and utterly helpless against her. If by some miracle someone (Arya, I am looking at you) manages to kill her, there is still a dragons and armies to take care of, it will be more blood. 

But just like any other tyrant, she will fall sooner or later and her kingdom will be remembered as one of the most tyrannical and bloodiest of Westeros, a cautionary tale if you wish. Who will be remembered as their allies? who will the other kingdoms will remembered as the ones who fought right along her to massacre innocent victims? 

The North, that's right, the Northern soldiers under Jon's command fought to put Daenerys on the throne. Others might have pledge their alliance with her but it was the North who actually send soldiers to her cause. Jon could have avoided this by accepting the terms that Cersei proposed, she still wouldn't have sent soldiers but the North would not have been obligated to help this monster and go in history as their allies in this horrible episode. 

I can't imagine that this the legacy that Ned Stark would have wanted for his house, unfortunately it is done and nothing will reverse that fact. 

Word to Dany, she now has ONE dragon and I'm not sure how dragon sex works, but you might not be able to get another dragon as easily.

Also, everyone knows that dragons are mortal and vulnerable.... Two died with relatively basic weapons.  So if she holds onto her throne by using drogon to scare people she better be careful.  And she better not decide to put him out there and whine when someone kills him.

[Drogo]

4 minutes ago, Soup333 said:

Am I alone in feeling like all four of the remaining Starks surviving (if they do) would feel unsatisfying? Trained assassin, I get it. Warrior, okay fine. But Sansa? She can’t die? Why tho?

What about this guy?  We really need him? 

[Affogato]

There probably is a part of the storyline where riding a dragon means you are in mental contact with a dragon and means you become more like a dragon as time goes on.  A metaphor for power.  When Varys is burnt Dany is talking and Drogan’s face appears behind her. Perhaps on an ideally tempered television it is always visible but I think the message that she has become the dragon remains. 

[Bryce Lynch]

6 minutes ago, RealReality said:

I hate our actions at Hiroshima and i think history has shown we were on the wrong side there.  However, I don't think anyone had surrendered when we bombed Hiroshima, so, it was an act taken in an active war.

Dany knew those people had surrendered and then undertook burning the women and children.  There was no active conflict.  So to me, the two are different.  

The Japanese had dug in their heels and there would have been hundreds of thousands of allied casualties and probably millions of Japanese killed in an invasion.    

It was totally different from what Dany was facing.  The city had been surrendered and was hers to take without further bloodshed.  

A WWII type scenario where Dany had to choose between burning a big part of King's Landing and killing say a hundred thousand, or having a prolonged siege, where 5 times as many might have died from starvation and disease would have been a lot more interesting than what D&D came up with.  

Edited May 14, 2019 by Bryce Lynch

[Macbeth]

18 hours ago, Amarsir said:

Which would be a justification for attacking the Red Keep itself. But she clearly went after a city that was no threat to her and only got around to the castle on a later pass.

I was surprised Dany didn't head straight to the Red Keep.   That Qyburn didn't plan for a way for Cersei to escape was also a surprise. 

The fact that Dany decided to kill everyone was not a surprise but very disappointing.  

[lucindabelle]

18 minutes ago, RealReality said:

I hate our actions at Hiroshima and i think history has shown we were on the wrong side there.  However, I don't think anyone had surrendered when we bombed Hiroshima, so, it was an act taken in an active war.

Dany knew those people had surrendered and then undertook burning the women and children.  There was no active conflict.  So to me, the two are different.  

Oh? My late father and uncles who fought in WWII disagreed.

dany going rogue after the surrender is of course preposterous. Still doesn’t make her Hitler and as a Jew I have to say that’s incredibly offensive in every respect.  Dany was trying to subdue a city not “exterminate” a particular group of people. 

Cersei deliberately used her own people as a human shield. She started a war. She blew up the sept. If you’re suggesting she is somehow the Jews or Europe that Hitler subdued you’re also saying those people were evil too. 

That comparison is really beyond. And again: backwards. 

[Affogato]

11 minutes ago, Macbeth said:

I was surprised Dany didn't head straight to the Red Keep.   That Qyburn didn't plan for a way for Cersei to escape was also a surprise. 

Qy ur. Did try to mke her go to Maelor’s something or another.  He was trying to get her to leave the keep. 

[lucindabelle]

24 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

A WWII type scenario where Dany had to choose between burning a big part of King's Landing and killing say a hundred thousand, or having a prolonged siege, where 5 times as many might have died from starvation and disease would have been a lot more interesting than what D&D came up with.  

It would have been waaaaay more interesting to give us that ethical dilemma where she had to choose between competing bads. We could then understand why some people would condemn her but others wouldn’t.

the ONLY way this makes sense is “mad queen dany” and it’s rushed. If it is NOT mad queen dany but a choice she made, it really does not jibe  with the queen who locked up her two dragon children after one child was killed. 

Either way, we the viewers lose.

[Lady S.]

1 hour ago, tv-talk said:

Ok I didnt do a rewatch or a reread so am fuzzy...didnt Dany conquer the cities of Slaver's Bay? Sure they may not have shown it on-screen, but what were we led to believe happened when these cities were defeated?

She conquered them, she did not destroy them. (She wouldn't have been able to stay in Meereen if she had.) Yunkai was not even sacked, and Meereen was sacked by its own slaves. We saw what happened when each city was defeated and the Unsullied never killed innocents until now.

Edited May 14, 2019 by Lady S.

[enoughcats]

49 minutes ago, RealReality said:

and his son (who was so minor that everyone kept forgetting his name)

This merits a minor quibble:  nobody who snickered at the name Dickon forgets it.  

[shireenbamfatheon]

All I wanted was a whole season of this:
 

 

 

1

Quote

Oh, my sweet summer child. What do you know about fear? Fear is for the winter when the snows fall a hundred feet deep. Fear is for the the long nights when the sun hides for years, and children are born and live and die, all in darkness. That is the time for fear, my little lord; when the white walkers move through the woods. Thousands of years ago there came a night that lasted a generation. Kings froze to death in their castles, same as the shepherds in their huts, and women smothered their babies rather than see them starve, and wept and felt their tears freeze on their cheeks. So is this the sort of story that you like? [watches as Bran nods] In that darkness the white walkers came for the first time. They swept through cities and kingdoms, riding their dead horses, hunting with their packs of pale spiders big as hounds...

Literally the thing I'd been looking forward to the most. Just make the Long Night last at least a year and show the psychological toll something this horrifying would have on people. Have the NK and his army make it past Winterfell and have WF as some safe haven since it was built with the same magic as the Wall. Just make the show full-out apocalyptic instead of what we got. Then they could split the final season between Cersei and Dany's reign. 

They had all the resources at their disposal. HBO was willing to give them more money, time and seasons. They could have hired more writers and directors, and if they were exhausted and wanted to be done with it, they could have someone else replace them as showrunners. 

[enoughcats]

9 minutes ago, lucindabelle said:

it really does not jibe  with the queen who locked up her two dragon children after one child was killed. 

I might have missed a discussion of this earlier in this thread, but I've been waiting for the two dragons to acknowledge Tyrion as their saviour.  Surely a dragon never forgets.

[Bryce Lynch]

9 minutes ago, lucindabelle said:

Oh? My late father and uncles who fought in WWII disagreed.

dany going rogue after the surrender is of course preposterous. Still doesn’t make her Hitler and as a Jew I have to say that’s incredibly offensive in every respect.  Dany was trying to subdue a city not “exterminate” a particular group of people. 

Cersei deliberately used her own people as a human shield. She started a war. She blew up the sept. If you’re suggesting she is somehow the Jews or Europe that Hitler subdued you’re also saying those people were evil too. 

That comparison is really beyond. And again: backwards. 

I don't think anyone is comparing Cersei to the Jews or Europe.   I think the innocent people that Dany slaughtered, after the battle was over, for no good reason, would be be more like the Jews or the people of Europe. 

But, Hitler systematically rounded up, enslaved, tortured and slaughtered millions over several years, so the comparison doesn't really hold up.

Still, what Dany did was a horrific war crime and crime against humanity.  If she had killed the same number of innocent people, as collateral damage, during the battle, she might be able to justify it.  But, they were slaughtered after the battle was over.

Cersei committed a horrible war crime by using her people was human shields.  But, ultimately Dany came up with an attack plan (somehow 10,000 times smarter than the one from a week earlier) that allowed her to defeat Cersei and take the city, with very little harm to those human shields.

That is what made her suddenly deciding to slaughter all the innocents, after the battle was won, all the more horrific and out of character.    

[Bryce Lynch]

11 minutes ago, enoughcats said:

This merits a minor quibble:  nobody who snickered at the name Dickon forgets it.  

I could watch this scene 1,000 times and laugh every time.  (OK, maybe I have already).  

Randyll Tarly may have abused Samwell all his life and threatened to murder him and make it look like an accident, if he didn't take the black and give up his birthright, land and titles.  

But, I'd argue he was even crueler to his younger son.  At least he didn't name Sam, "Dickon".   

I think the real reason Dickon chose to die with his father was that he didn't want to go on having people laugh at his name.  

[Bryce Lynch]

11 minutes ago, enoughcats said:

I might have missed a discussion of this earlier in this thread, but I've been waiting for the two dragons to acknowledge Tyrion as their saviour.  Surely a dragon never forgets.

Well, that won't be happening now, as the two he unchained are both dead (one of them, dead, undead and re-dead).   

[AuntieMame]

1 hour ago, Bryce Lynch said:

I don't think anyone is comparing Cersei to the Jews or Europe.   I think the innocent people that Dany slaughtered, after the battle was over, for no good reason, would be be more like the Jews or the people of Europe. 

But, Hitler systematically rounded up, enslaved, tortured and slaughtered millions over several years, so the comparison doesn't really hold up.

Still, what Dany did was a horrific war crime and crime against humanity.  If she had killed the same number of innocent people, as collateral damage, during the battle, she might be able to justify it.  But, they were slaughtered after the battle was over.

Cersei committed a horrible war crime by using her people was human shields.  But, ultimately Dany came up with an attack plan (somehow 10,000 times smarter than the one from a week earlier) that allowed her to defeat Cersei and take the city, with very little harm to those human shields.

That is what made her suddenly deciding to slaughter all the innocents, after the battle was won, all the more horrific and out of character.    

Aren't all wars ultimately filled with war crimes and the literal slaughter of innocents? And isn't this fact something our art should be examining rather than the easy projection of evil into the enemy/other so that we can watch heroes fighting "evil"? The awful truth that none of us wants to face is that most of the evil comes from us. Yeah, I don't quite know what to do with this either but the fact that these writers haven't bothered to wrestle with the contradictions of human character really bothers me. For all of Martin's faults, I think he at least tried. 

Edited May 14, 2019 by AuntieMame
Because wars aren't ears and my autocorrect was coded by an insane person.

[VCRTracking]

I love Jenny Nicholson satire videos:

Her video is a parody of the recent "Beauty YouTube" drama between makeup "influencers" Tati and her now-ex friend and protege James Charles. Buzzfeed has a handy guide for the uninitiated:  A Brief Explainer Of Tati Westbrook Aka The YouTuber Who Exposed James Charles

Here's the video Jenny was spoofing:

Which was a response to this:

Edited May 14, 2019 by VCRTracking

[Bryce Lynch]

1 minute ago, AuntieMame said:

Aren't all ears ultimately filled with war crimes and the literal slaughter of innocents? And isn't this fact something our art should be examining rather than the easy projection of evil into the enemy/other so that we can watch heroes fighting "evil"? The awful truth that none of us wants to face is that most of the evil comes from us. Yeah, I don't quite know what to do with this either but the fact that these writers haven't bothered to wrestle with the contradictions of human character really bothers me. For all of Martin's faults, I think he at least tried. 

There are probably scattered atrocities in most wars.  But, I think it is rare for innocent people to be deliberately targeted, especially at the scale that Dany did it.  

[Law Mom]

13 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

I think the real reason Dickon chose to die with his father was that he didn't want to go on having people laugh at his name.  

He should have moved north of the wall. Tormund had never heard of that word. But he liked it!

[AuntieMame]

3 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

There are probably scattered atrocities in most wars.  But, I think it is rare for innocent people to be deliberately targeted, especially at the scale that Dany did it.  

Non-combatants have always had the highest casualty figures during war. Always. Especially if you are unlucky enough that the war is held in your ground. The estimates for dead during WWII range from sixty to a hundred million depending on the source and historian. The vast majority of these deaths are civilian. Now you can quibble that dying of starvation during say the Siege of Leningrad isn't directly a death by combat, but it is a death by war and because of military decisions taken at the top. War always has and always will kill more civilians than anyone else. One of the few things I liked about the Bells is that we did get some sense of just how awful it is, but the reasons for showing the horror are all in narrative service to justifying war. 

[Tesla]

It seems to me that Varys will be the one to kill Dany.  Rewatching the scene with the Little Bird, it looks like he is poisoning her food through the child working in the kitchen.  She was never called off either so it may still happen.  Or I may be seeing something that isn't there. 

[Law Mom]

19 minutes ago, VCRTracking said:

I love Jenny Nicholson satire videos:

Her video is a parody of the recent "Beauty YouTube" drama between makeup gurus Tati and her now-ex friend and protege James Charles. Buzzfeed has a handy guide for the uninitiated:  A Brief Explainer Of Tati Westbrook Aka The YouTuber Who Exposed James Charles

I've been following the drama. Proud to be part of the 2M who unsubbed that jerk. The parody video is fantastic! #TeamTati

[Clawdette]

Apparently, I'm not the only one associating this episode with modern music.  Last night as I mowed the grass with my Beats over my ears, I was listening to one of my playlists.  It didn't have a theme - just a random selection of music I like.  I was replaying Episode Five in my mind and couldn't believe how many songs came up that aligned with it.

I think that in terms of military strategy, Fall Out Boys "This Ain't a Scene it's an Arms Race." is pretty accurate.  Danys held all the cards in that race.

The Black Keys' "Little Black Submarine" pegs Dany with the lines,
"Oh can it be
The voices calling me
They get lost
And out of time
I should've seen it glow
But everybody knows
That a broken heart is blind"

Jon could have sung Alex Clare's "Too Close" in his scene with Dany.
"You know I'm not one to break promises
I don't want to hurt you but I need to breathe
At the end of it all, you're still my best friend
But there's something inside that I need to release
Which way is right, which way is wrong
How do I say that I need to move on?
You know we're heading separate ways"

And, when Stevie Wonder started his "Higher Ground" I immediately thought of Jon Snow and how much he longs to return north. 

[Snowball II]

11 hours ago, Umbelina said:

She doesn't handle rejection well.

This should be the new title of Dany's thread.

[Soup333]

7 hours ago, spaceghostess said:

Hmm. Not only did I take English 101, I graduated with a degree in it and went on to a career in publishing. Reading other people's novels (across all genres) has been part of my job for the last 20 years, and hey! I didn't see this coming. Because D&D's story and character building didn't support it.

Also, as someone who was married to a malignant narcissist for 16 years and spent two years divorcing him, I had to learn plenty about what makes them tick in order to recover from his abuse and to protect my children from being well and truly fucked up by him (this is a work in progress). Based on this research, as well as personal (not professional!) experience, I have to disagree with your assessment. It's easy enough to cherry-pick terms from the DSM that match up with Dany at her worst, but there are other key behaviors we haven't seen her display but that all narcissists exhibit:

1. Lying. All narcs lie, whether to prop up their egos, cover their asses, or just for kicks (because they get off on the power of knowing they're putting one over on somebody). Dany's been called many things, but "liar" isn't one of them.

2. Cruelty, especially via manipulation, to reliable/primary sources of supply. This happens when (a) a normally compliant source presents unexpected resistance, and/or (b) the narc is getting bored with the supply source. If Dany were a narcissist, she'd deal out spontaneous and casual cruelty to even her closest and most reliable sources of supply just because she can. She'd play her advisors off against one another to see how far they'd go to curry her favor. Or you'd see her being a bitch to Missandei, for example, for no discernible reason. Narcissists can be extremely charming and warm, but the mask comes down eventually. 

3. Unmitigated selfishness. As you pointed out, a narcissist is only "generous" when gathering supply or tap- dancing to keep it. Victims of narcissistic abuse will tell you how,  in the "honeymoon phase," the narc was such a great listener, so interested in everything they had to say. This ends once the supply source has been secured, therefore Dany, having secured Missandei, wouldn't have been particularly interested in her "friend"'s growing feelings for Grey Worm, for instance. Their intimate conversation about that was a genuine moment of friendship. Dany listened to and cared about what Missandei had to say. Narcs don't engage in these types of exchanges unless there's something in it for them or they fear losing supply. What a supply source thinks are deep, meaningful "conversations" are, upon closer examination, actually long stretches of the narc talking about him/herself.

Oh--and no way would a narcissist risk him/herself and/or his/her powerful toys (because children--dragon or otherwise--are nothing but toys for a narc) to save OTHER people. Sure, you could say Dany's actions at the Battle of Winterfell were the ultimate supply harvest, but I'd say not, because the risk to her person in order to gain that potential supply was way too high.

So no, I don't believe Dany is a narcissist. But your post got me thinking about how D&D could have made her one. Just a few scenes per season of her exhibiting truly narcissistic behaviors would have helped lay compelling groundwork to support what the last two episodes would now have us believe.

People are retconning the hell out of the past seasons to make the logic work. Dany is no narcissist. If they’d the done full seasons they could have sold her turn to insanity. Alas, the did not and I’m not buying it. No matter how many people say we should have seen this coming. Nah. I rebuke the idea that she was preordained to lose her shit. 

[Clanstarling]

1 hour ago, Bryce Lynch said:

I always liked the way Cersei basically kept the haircut Septa Unella gave her for her walk of atonement.  

Reminds me of early on in the series when Tyrion tells Jon to embrace the worst people say about you and own it. Then it can never hurt you again. Perhaps that's a Lannister philosophy.

[Kate47]

2 hours ago, Lady S. said:

Dany's only had a full Dothraki horde since s6 and they never sacked any cities for her before this, the most we saw was them killing the Harpies outside the gates of Meereen. The advantage of the Unsullied is supposed to be that they don't go on rampages of their own accord and they had specific orders about who to kill in Astapor. Dany's been threatening to destroy cities since s2 but she's never actually done so until now. 

Anyway, one thing I liked about the sack was that it wasn't just the inhuman brown foreigners raping and murdering. Every Westerosi except Jon and Davos ran right in there. (I honestly don't get how people could miss it was one of Jon's own men he killed trying to rape a woman, as the northmen/valemen and Dothraki look nothing alike.) 

There was a really quick scene that I loved, where Jon is looking around at all this devastation and sees a Lannister guardsman guiding civilians to a safer path.

They really gave no doubt as to who the villain was, and they did a solid job of showing the bloodthirsty vengeance that the supposed heroes display. Thr fact that the lines were so blurred really added to the shock around the sacking of the city.

[penelope79]

47 minutes ago, shireenbamfatheon said:

All I wanted was a whole season of this:
 

Literally the thing I'd been looking forward to the most. Just make the Long Night last at least a year and show the psychological toll something this horrifying would have on people. Have the NK and his army make it past Winterfell and have WF as some safe haven since it was built with the same magic as the Wall. Just make the show full-out apocalyptic instead of what we got. Then they could split the final season between Cersei and Dany's reign. 

They had all the resources at their disposal. HBO was willing to give them more money, time and seasons. They could have hired more writers and directors, and if they were exhausted and wanted to be done with it, they could have someone else replace them as showrunners. 

This, 1000 times. 7 seasons and a half of "Winter is coming" and it lasted less than one hour, with the NK defeated in a few minutes. It would've been so much clever (narratively speaking) to let the NK fly to King's Landing and let him party over there while everybody was expecting him in Winterfell. It would have given Cersei (and KL's population) a lesson, they would've all worked toward a direction and, in the end, people would have still had to choose between Jon or Dany, but without the massacre and, most of all, character assassination. Cersei would've had a much appropriate death anyway, Jaime's arc would've still been completed and useful and Dany would still be Dany and not... whatever they turned her into. But I am not D&D, what do I know. 😞

[JennyMominFL]

3 hours ago, Clanstarling said:

Fun fact, the guillotine was invented as a more merciful execution device because, unlike beheadings, it was swift and sure.

The fortress in medieval times, which Westeros mimics, was always the place of shelter - where the food and supplies were kept and typically the folk were well away from the soldiers. Granted, this was a big city and not everyone would fit. But it would be the first place people would go.

I have pretty much the same background (with a few more years of experience), and I did see it coming. I do agree, however, that narcissist is not a correct descriptor for Dany.

Google Margaret Pole’s  execution. She was  and old woman , the last Plantagenet. She fought the execution and had her head and shoulders hacked up. There is something to be said for the guillotine. Id rather die that way than crucifixion

[Bryce Lynch]

5 minutes ago, Tesla said:

It seems to me that Varys will be the one to kill Dany.  Rewatching the scene with the Little Bird, it looks like he is poisoning her food through the child working in the kitchen.  She was never called off either so it may still happen.  Or I may be seeing something that isn't there. 

He was trying to poison her, but the girl said she wasn't eating.  Martha, the little bird, was obviously afraid that Dany's soldiers would catch her, so I doubt that she would continue to try, now that Varys is no longer around to give her the great reward he promised her.  

Varys killing her from beyond the ashes, would be an interesting way to do it, but I have a feeling the writers will go for something more dramatic.  

Though, one possibility could be a Hamlet type situation, where Dany kills Jon, only to find that she is already dying of the poison, Varys' little bird put in her food.  I doubt that will happen, though.  

[Bryce Lynch]

4 minutes ago, JennyMominFL said:

Google Margaret Pole’s  execution. She was  and old woman , the last Plantagenet. She fought the execution and had her head and shoulders hacked up. There is something to be said for the guillotine. Id rather die that way than crucifixion

I wonder if she was the inspiration for Ser Rodrick's beheading.  

[JennyMominFL]

2 hours ago, tv-talk said:

Ok I didnt do a rewatch or a reread so am fuzzy...didnt Dany conquer the cities of Slaver's Bay? Sure they may not have shown it on-screen, but what were we led to believe happened when these cities were defeated?

I do remember a line asking how long it took for a city to be sacked. I dont remember the who and when but it was Dany’s story

[Lady S.]

[JennyMominFL]

7 minutes ago, Bryce Lynch said:

I wonder if she was the inspiration for Ser Rodrick's beheading.  

His felt a bit more Mary Queen of Scots to me although Mary was beheaded with an axe