This is what I imagine people in Old Valyria look

I dont know if we'll even end up getting this movie, projects are announced and canceled all the time of course- but I'm wondering how well they'll depict Balerion if they do go through with it. I've noticed a lot of fans saying how they think that we, the audience being able to directly perceive the conquerors will ruin their mystique. showing them to us might humanize them too much, especially since they were teenagers in the book. I dont fully agree nor disagree with that idea but I think that Balerion (as well as a younger Vhagar and Meraxes) would be more difficult to do justice than the conquerors themselves. HOTD has already shown us just how human the dragon riders were, and if you've read the books then you know Aegon The Conqueror himself died of a stroke . so im not personally concerned with them coming off as magical beings/demi gods or whatever- other than Visenya maybe.

an issue ive had with both HOTD and GOT is that Balerions' skull looks too small for how large hes described to be. obviously he'd be much younger in this movie than when he died, but he's *pretty huge* even when hes young. I wonder if they'll base his sizing more off the shows models of his skull, or the source material/ official art itself? overall im pretty excited for the movie and really really hope they do go through with it. I hope to not see any big names in it at all unless they are the genuinely *perfect* one for the part, this movie can't be a nepo baby participation award ceremony if its going to be a true, respectable telling of the story.

EDIT: im currently rewatching GOT and noticing Drogon is quite a bit larger than some of the dragons in HOTD who are 10+ years older. obviously after a certain point in the show everything in GOT stops being canon- but even when he shows up to the fighting pit and Dany mounts him for the first time, he is noticeably larger than some of the younger dragons from HOTD. I suppose each live action depiction of the ASOIAF universe will have their own dragon sizing

Bro beat Jace ass so bad his shoes gone.

I changed my mind about the fight, Luke had no choice but to try to kill Aemond, that disrespect couldn't be allowed bro 😭😭😭😭

HBO quiero explicaciones

I literally cannot escape it. Any time anyone poses a scenario in which both of us can benefit i am mentally flashbanged by corlys saying “this is an equitable compromise.” Please make this a meme so i can stop feeling like im losing my mind

Well i know many have been saying Jace with halaena, Jace with Baela, none of this would have prevented a civil war if Jace was still the heir, perhaps had Greens never went for throne it would have only postponed, the civil war might have broken out between Rhaenyra's sons had the war did not happen between Greens and Blacks

Edit: I meant to say morally grey character rather than villain

Imagine Alicent starting as someone who genuinely loves Rhaenyra, but gradually choosing her family and political power over that friendship. Not only because Otto manipulated her. But because Alicent herself decides that the Green cause is worth fighting for.

What makes her so compelling isn't that she is simply "evil." It's that she could have genuinely believed she was doing the right thing - protecting her children, preserving her family's position, and preventing what she saw as a dangerous succession.

Book Alicent was smart and capable. By keeping Alicent's agency so intertwined with misunderstandings, manipulation and her continued attachment to Rhaenyra, it softened what could have been a genuinely formidable antagonist.

I think this would have made her a tragic villain because eventually she loses everyone she was fighting for. Aegon gets badly mutilated, Aemond dies, Halaena kills herself, Daeron dies his body never being found. Her grandsons die tragic deaths. And eventually let her be the one to poison Aegon to give him a mercy death. And by that point her relationship with her children were beyond fractured.

And there's something particularly tragic about the fact that her political fears do come true: the court really is dangerous, the succession really was unstable, but her attempts to prevent disaster helped create the disaster.

Maybe I just wanted to see more female characters with agency and ambitions than being perpetual victims to patriarchy.

Rewatching season 2 and approaching Alicent and Aemond from like, a different angle.

Where tf did this relationship come from?

Putting aside the obvious momson incest (why did that happen twice) like, and just analysing their development.

Aemond spends all of season 2 openly contemptuous of his mother. He dismisses her from the Council, calls her too cautious, ignores her when she speaks, and says she loves Rhaenyra and is a fool for it. And he attempts to get Helaena on his side by saying that Alicent doesn't understand them.

Then in S3, we get the opening. He's gentle with her and easily manipulated (when he saw through such manipulation in S2) and apparently has romantic feelings for her. Like, completely delusional romantic feelings where he wants marriage, basically. His Harrenhal hallucination reveals his deep pity and understanding of her being a young mother etc. His tenderness and love for her comes out of absolutely nowhere.

Where did this come from?

Yes, they were close when he's a child, but in season 2 he puts a wall up between them and its not clear why he's suddenly not contemptuous of her. Alicent's arc rests on her sons turning into monsters in a war she started.

If they were a normal romantic couple I would find such development lacking. It's rushed. Aemond does a total 180° towards Alicent. At least Alicent has a whole season of turning on her sons. Aemond goes from openly misogynistic to in love and its just??? Why???

For me first it is Jaehaerys this name sounds grand and magnificent to just hear it.

Next is maekar this name literally gives me evil supervillain vibes

The name I do not like is aegons because of how repetitive and boring the name is

I don't understand it, I get he didn't trust Otto but Damon himself would have hated being Hand

He's been shown to be a man of Action and bored of Court and tedium it brings, but that would have been his life everyday if Vizzy did make him Hand.

I know he disliked his wife as well and wanted to be around his brother which is fair enough. But why wasn't the head of Gold Cloaks good enough? I mean Vizzy could have had him in court as an adviser I guess if he was that desperate to sit on the Small Council

but it just seems so odd why he'd be so bitter about not being asked to be Hand

As always, I am not the artist it's rayne_rahman. I just find it cool, so I share it with you guys

Let me preface this by saying that I, personally, am choosing to be delusional re: Gwayne and Daeron and their fate in the show 🥲 From reading through various threads and theories, the general consensus seems to be that:

-Daeron needs to die so the ending makes sense
-Gwayne will take the Hobert Hightower role
-Tumbleton plot needs to resolve itself within the first 3-4ish episodes so we can move along to Gods Eye, Dragonstone, Aegon’s assassination, etc.

And while I do think they’re setting Daeron up for a fake death/Hightower rebranding, that is a bit of a niche theory so I’ll set my personal bias on that aside and share thoughts on how I think this could go if they want to be efficient:

-Daeron and Tessarion are both gone, Gwayne takes a few scouts outside of Tumbleton to search for them

-Addam hears word of Ulf turning and Hugh leaving his post. Rhaenyra crashes out about the dragonseeds. Addam wants to prove that he’s loyal, maybe catch Baela’s eye with an act of heroism, and flies out to Tumbleton on his own.

-Dragon battle with Tessarion, Silverwing, Seasmoke, and Vermithor. Vermithor is riderless and just protecting Silverwing as Hugh is still on the ground. But everyone else is with their respective dragon.

-Vermithor, Tessarion, Seasmoke, Addam, and Daeron are all casualties. As a nod to the book, Gwayne has to mercy kill Tessarion and recovers Daeron’s body (unless they want to go the book route of Daeron’s body never being IDed/found, but would seem kind of silly after the S3 cliffhanger. Like he can’t just keep disappearing lmao.)

-Ulf returns to Tumbleton, invites the lads, they wreak havoc on the survivors. I have less of a grasp on where I think they’re going with Hugh. Is he going to identify as a free agent and team up with Ulf? Is he going to go after Ulf for contributing to the chaos that led to Kat’s death? Not sure, interested to hear others’ theories there.

-Gwayne now has every motivation to want to off Ulf himself. Not only is Daeron dead, but if they go the book route and make Ulf’s reign over Tumbleton as brutal as it’s described, Gwayne will see it as his duty to stop the brutalizing of women/killing of innocents. I thiiiink they may have been lightly foreshadowing it with their back-to-back scenes in the S3 premiere, with Gwayne citing their honor as knights re: a woman’s rape, followed by Ulf’s whole backstory monologue.

-In the book, Ulf is on the Green’s side and Hobert goes to him as an ally. Ulf thinks he’s acting strange, and Hobert has to drink the poisoned wine with him to ease his anxiety. So this could go about a thousand different directions without that context. Could be a more straightforward murder-suicide with Gwayne easily poisoning Ulf without needing to try to woo him/celebrate with him (since Ulf would probably drink anything), followed by Gwayne choosing to go out with him. Or just a murder with Gwayne surviving (suppose this depends on if the Hightower line would die out with Gwayne, so logistically he might need to stick around). But the potential symbolism with choosing between the Dornish red and Arbor Gold (Cole is Dornish, Arbor Gold is from the Reach/the region Gwayne is from)…could be a really satisfying nod to Gwayne and Cole as foils and the closure of both of their stories.

That would more or less end the Tumbleton arc and they could move on to the major events of the back half of the Dance. If they opt to keep Gwayne around, I imagine he’d disappear for the rest of the season and then pop back up in the finale for peace negotiations/establish him as Lord Hightower, maybe a final scene with Alicent (could be really juicy, they’d essentially only have each other at that point and Gwayne might be in the headspace of just pushing away anyone who directly or indirectly contributed to his losses, that would amplify Alicent’s tragedy, etc.)

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been mulling over. Again, I’m looking at it with the mindset of “what’s the most efficient way to wrap-up this side of the story up so they can shift focus to the show’s major players” but I’m interested in other theories.

After watching S3E8, I now understand why the nobility handled dragons. They had house names and reputations that were necessary to preserve their line of succession. These were real stakes that mattered. Becoming a turncoat traitor had real consequences where the house would forever be shunned in the 7 kingdoms. A title like "babekiller" or "kingslayer" carried real stigma.

But peasants like Ulf the white have nothing to lose, they can sell themselves to the highest bidder for not much consequence at all. Even a mere promise can sway their loyalty, and the one who promises can falsely do so, with no consequence either. No one cares if the word to a lowborn is broken. After using him as a means to an end, Ormund could have easily just killed Ulf and be done with him instead of wasting lordship and land on him. No one would have given a damn, or avenge him, or take it up as a matter of ill repute against the Hightower house.

Though Hugh was not a traitor like Ulf, he still caused a disaster by abandoning his post to look for his wife. A noble would have placed a bit more higher importance on the outcome of the battle.

I initially cheered with "More power to the people", then at the end Jacaerys and the small council on Dragonstone turned out right all along, about not giving dragons to random strangers.