Rhaenyra is the system. She is Royal Privilege incarnate. She is sheltered and protected from consequences by her father, the patriarch of the family and ultimate enforcer of the system. She is named heiress and ever since then is free to engage in actions that would have seen her exiled or killed if she was anyone else. She does not do it against the system, she does it with the approval of the system.

She defies nothing. She helps enforce the same System that she is supposedly against, by pushing for her bastards to succeed her and her first husband to the Iron and Driftwood Thrones, with both current occupants knowing and allowing her bastards to be recognized as legitimate heirs. She expects full submission from all to her status as heiress and future monarch, with no intention of changing a single thing about The System.

Good day my friend (or night as it is here) , i wanted to present my reasons to why i support the green faction (as it as been shown ) and hopefully get a discussion going , let's begin .

P.s. Forgive my grammar im italian and i kinda suck at writing in english and some of this point are carbon copy of other opinion that convinced me to side with the Green

-The King should not had mantain Rhaenyra as it's heir from a somewhat legal and philosofical point of view :

In the show our Rhaenyra had been made heir after everyone and theyr mother's concurred in don't wanting Daemon as future king (because the ..... implication) Viserys in my mind had actually choose well , Andal succession law (as it's shown in ASOIAF ) state that a daughter come before an uncle (but there are exepction since succession laws as stated by Martin are pretty muddled), Visery choosing is daughter was from a legal standpoint unattacable but after the birth of his sons his position of manteining Rhaenyra as heir go against the traditional Andal and First men succession dynamic that as been going on for a good 8000 years .

But Luca097 didn't the Targaryen never officially specify succession (because they were completely idiot)?

Your almost right strange voice in my head , while there is technically no official law about royal succession the precedent (King Jaehaerys took the throne over his older sisters. he consistently named males over females for his heirs. the great council at Harrenhal once again chose a male heir over a the son of a female heir. And the targaryen on Dragonstone always choose male primogeniture from what i know) had enstablish Male superiority in regard of succession , with the council of Harrenhall if not making it de-facto law at least showing a strong preference by the nobility.

Ok , but didn't Viserys as king as the right to change the law?

Now that's a good question , the Targaryen (being a bunch of idiots) it seems that they didn't specify how much power the king posses on matter of succession (see Harrenhal as an example were the king had to "ask" the nobility ) and in general how much power a Targ king posses in the legal sense(they seems to be Absolute monarch but they lack everything an absolute monarch need

Well the seven kingdom aren't an absoulute monarchy : Nobility as entreched rights , they mantein vast military forces , the lord paramount ARE the de-facto law in theyr domain and they can choose what to do as long as they pay taxes , there is no vast burocracy to permit to the king to centralize is power etc etc .), so i choose to see it under a more "philosofical" sense . Should the king have to power to change at will the Law no matter how ancient ? I sincerely answer NO , while in the ASOIAF universe the social contract seems to almost not existing , with for example the so called smallfolk having almost no rights (in medieval western europe the vast majority of paesant were free and had many rights , it happened more regulary that is seems that a village would bring the lord/signore/knight to trial for a miriad of things) the king is still subject at least a bit to the law , if the Targaryen monarch can change the law at will it will devolve in a Tyranny and this is something i can't accept for my personal belief.

- Alicent is rightfully scared for her children

This is more easy to explain , if Alicent dropped dead tomorrow and Rhaenyra somehow ascended the throne uncontested despite her own staggering ability to self-sabotage; the Strong Boys illegitimacy is going to mean that her reign is ultimately the same dynastic limbo Jaehaerys and Viserys turned out to be; dragonriders or notAegon, Helaena and Aemond; and any children of theirs would have a better claim to the Throne, as would Daemon's daughters. Fuck, the only people the Strong boys are ahead of in succession if called out are Saera's descendants . At best, it'll require yet another Great Council that Rhaenyra's preferred claimants will almost certainly loose (the Great Houses have no choice but to tolerate the Targaryens' eccentricities, but not when it's disruptions set a bad example for their succession) in favor of one of her brothers' or their kids; or it's Maegor vs Aegon all over again , for Rhaenys to even hope to secure her children claim she will had to kill Alicent children , if not they will become a lighting rod for anyone that would rightfully not accept Bastards on the throne .

But Rhaenyra offered Alicent to marry Haelena to Jaerys

True but Rhaenyra offering to marry Helaena to Jacaerys wasn't compromise, it was an act of desperation where only she benefits, as she realized that no one is buying the lie that her sons are Laenor's. Alicent's sons would be in the same amount of risk as before, while Helaena would serve to add legitimacy to the line of Jacaerys (and at worst even add incentive to get rid of Alicent's sons ASAP). Making Jace's uncles his brothers-in-law adds exactly nothing to the incentives to not harm them.

-Rhaenyra is a dumbass , a loveable one at first , but a dumbass

This is easy enough , Rhaeneyra might have been able to ascend the throne if she had done her duty ,but instead she decide to fathered bastards and than claim they are legit and everyone bloody knows it , this is like the stupidest think she could had done .

Who cares they still are her children

The nobility cares , and yes they are her children but they are not legitimate , succession law exist to make the transition of power from Noble A to Noble B as smoth as possible to avoid conflict , if you start to violate something as big as children legitimacy that stability is gonna go to hell

Final tought

This is almost all i just want to finish with a bit of defence of Alicent , i try to watch the show not only with my morale but trying to understand how the character must thinking and many people it seems doesn't understand that she is a woman of her time with morales of her time because from a westerosi prospective she is great : she's a dutyfull wife , she gave her husband children (only 3 but it seems that in westeros child mortality is at modern day level) she very pious (And it was fucking important in the Middle ages) .

She lived a very priviledge life and she did the duty her station expect of her , a medieval society was about that , privilege and duty , both the paesant as the king had duties to perform and it sucked for everyone , women were married off and boys were sent to the battlefield (im actually from a cadet branch of the Ieta Noble family and with the number of men dying in some battlefield for the venetian republic every generation it's a miracle that im alive) , this is how the world worked in similar times and it was necessary to follow this order to try to mantain order .

I feel like some of this criticism towards the show being pro-Black is unfounded, but there is truth to the sentiments, specifically in how key moments in the narrative have been framed and brushed over, while similar things have been focused on in a different manner

For example, the dichotomy between focusing on the girl Aegon rapes vs completely disregarding the person that Daemon killed to let Laenor escape his life

We get a lot of focus on Dyana and get showcased Alicient's veneer of hypocrisy- she who veils herself in religion but covers up her son's heinous crimes. Then we get a scene of her disparging her son for his vile behavior and hugging Helaena for the shame Aegon brings to others and his own marriage.

On the other hand, when Rhaenyra and Daemon plan for the fake-death of Laenor, the guy Daemon kills is a completely throwaway moment, and the focus of the scene is how there plan allows for Laenor to leave Westeros behind and live a happy life

Simply put, these two scenes where two random, "unimportant" people are victimized are presented in completely different manners which provoke completely different reactions from the audience. With the Laenor scene, the audience walks away happy because Rhaenyra and Daemon don't kill Laenor like it seemed they would from their speech and the focus is triumphant and just. The dead guy doesn't matter in the slightest. With Dyana, it completely shatters any sort of character arc or sympathy that Aegon may have had and firmly places him- who is the figurehead of the Greens- to be a character that is reviled by the audience and whose downfall is something to look forward to. Who the hell can even possibly support a rapist? Murder is something audience members can forgive, justify and accept- rape never ever

There are other moments throughout the show that are along the same lines. For example, giving Rhaenyra the opportunity to propose a marriage between Jace and Helaena as a peace offering that is rejected places her in a more sympathetic light as someone who was genuinely trying to reach out and make amends. I understand that this is an adaption and things are justifiably changed, but in the books, Corlys immediately has Jace and Luke bethroed to Baela and Rhaena so his true blood ends up on the throne and the insult of trying to pass off Strong bastards as true-born Velaryons is lessened. By making Corlys literally not care about blood and names, it gives the show an opportunity to make Rhaenyra look better

They also remove some of the brutality and ruthlessness of Rhaenyra. Instead of ordering the death of Vaemond and feeding his corpse to Syrax for insulting the parentage of her children, Vaemond is killed in court. And although violent and sudden, it is framed in a "good" way to the audience, since it directly follows the amazing Viserys sequence of coming to the throne and defending his daughter, along with the incredibly touching Daemon-Viserys moment of helping him to the throne

Likewise, the "questioned sharply" line following Aemond's mutilation is not framed in a way to express to the audience that Rhaenyra meant for Aemond to be tortured. She says he must be questioned sharply and then that transitions to Viserys simply questioning Aemond

This is kind of what, for me, makes the show pro-Black. If I had to characterize the show, I would say it's pro-Black and goes out of its way to make Alicient sympathetic. But overall it doesn't care too much for the Greens

I also feel like they slightly undermined the story that they themselves were trying to tell and set-up prior to the episode 6 timeskip and change-up of the actors. The show was clearly setting up that the primary motivation of the Greens was Alicient fearing for the safety of her children and family from Rhaenyra (with the rift starting by Rhaenyra's lies at the Godswood and Otto's departure in the rain) and the danger that Daemon posed

This would have required the Blacks and Daemon to be more unsavory and vicious in the post-timeskip episodes than they ended up being at all, because the show went out of its way to avoid that kind of stuff. For example- and this is a huge point that I think has been overlooked- the whole point of Rhaenyra and Daemon faking the death of Laenor was to signal to their enemies- ie Alicient and the Greens- that they were dangerous and should not be messed with.

The death of Laenor should have struck some fear in Alicient over what the two newly weds could have done to her own children. But narratively, literally the only consequence of Laenor's death was to introduce some temporary tension between the Blacks and Rhaenys that is ultimately resolved in the very same episode. The potential impact it should have had on Alicient is just not present

Another consequence that was completely ignored was the impact Rhaenyra and Daemon's marriage should have had on Viserys. It was already set up that he greatly disproved of whatever was going on between the two of them in the earlier episodes, but there was no payoff to that once they got married. In the books, this is what causes Viserys to kick Rhaenyra out of court, but the show instead wanted to focus on the positive relationship between Rhaenyra and Viserys and Daemon and Viserys in his last episode

Now I'm not saying that that decision was a bad one- it was really touching and incredibly emotional- but paired up with everything else, I think the post-timeskip show has definitely tilted the narrative to be pro-Black and undermine what earlier parts of the story was trying to set up. It's doing this while also trying to maintain some sympathy for Alicient

After a long day of rage over the final episode now that i am calm  I thought about what will happen next ...... and well the situation is shit:

Let’s start with the creation of an elective monarchy for westeros dooming the continent to constant civil strife , let me explain , Westeros as a continent has always remained united under the figure of a king whose death would have been followed by another of the same dynasty, this passage of power made the kingdom quite stable, the great houses were fighting among themselves but the figure of the absolute ruler kept them quiet.With the creation of an elective monarchy this stability has been replaced with the perennial risk of wars caused by the succession, let's take an example, he is elected with 4 votes against 2 (we think that every kingdom has a vote) a lord of the Iron Islands, now if the two votes against are from the Westerland and from the Reach what do you think will happen, obviously the 2 richest, militarily strong, and populous regions will not accept this and Bum civil war, or we make the case that there is a vote 3 against 3 what it happens ...... civil war etc etc, elective monarchies have always been in history creators of serious problems, in fact it is enough a ambitious general with an army powerful enough to be make himself be “elected” king .

Second point reach is about to end in civil war. For some bizarre reason Highgarden instead of being given to one of the two families with actual rights over it (Hightower and Redwine) decided to give it to Broon , the man who sacked Highgarden and the man without any noble lineage, seriously what do you think will happen (and before anyone says "but Bran can predict it" you know what Caesar had predicted the third Gallic rebellion that did not prevent the Aedui and Averni from raising an army) even though he suffered a lot during the war the region can deploy around 35,000 - 45,000 men (downward estimates) and certainly none of them will fight for a mercenary who has actively participated in the looting of their cities.

Then all the minor things, the North after the losses suffered in the last 10 years will be in an economic and demographic crisis without precedents , Dorne will became the strongest kingdom ( they did not partake in any war ) , the westerland will be a battlefield of political rivalry beetwen lannister family faction and the stormland will suffer internal strife having a young untrained lord in command .

What a shitty episode ...... a shitty season , let’s start.

ok let's start with the positive things: excellent visualization of how the sack of a city takes place (with the soldiers who are taken by the bloodlust and do not obey the orders) and the character of arya seems for about 13 seconds to resume his true charisma (the revenge does not do well) and Jon always remains Jon and the cleganebowl even if it wasn’t remotly epic as i expected .

Now with the rage :  HOLY HEAVEN 8 seasons I say 8 and wich you can have dany gone to a darker path (her path was always with dark parth) but you choose to le her go crazy in the last 2 episodes, I say it and I repeat I wrote 2 posts that explained his actions until the fifth season but Daenarys was never one of the favorite characters, but PORCA PUTTANA you make me mad like that. Second they have definitively destroy the characterization of Jaime but fuck off DnD and their mothers whores, Martin made him grow and made him understand that Cersei was like a testicular cancer for him and DnD what they do THEY MAKE HIM GO BACK TO HER SURE . Now go back to Daenarys ..... WHY WHY where is the fucking logic she didn’t burn the city before they surrender ,why after ??? for the love of god this episode was stupid .  So for me little idiot who love the ASOIAF book how i rate this episode ?

Good morning friends and good 1st May, now that much of the anger that has gone up this Monday morning has disappeared I want to talk about what I think of 8x03, I will divide this post into a strategic analysis and then into a small speech about what I think.

STRATEGY

Let's start with the completely idiotic strategy implemented in this episode, DnD as usual they forgot that at the war council Jon, Jamie and Lord Royce will have studied from childhood how to prepare the defense of a castle and Tyrion and Davos have some rudimentary knowledge , then explain to me why not only did they leave the bulk of their forces outside the castle but they didn't even prepare a serious series of trenches (and don't tell me "they didn't have time" at least from the news of the fall of the wall to the battle have at least had 3 days, you tell me that 35000 people fail to dig perimeter trenches, damn a Legionary Cohort could make one in less than 2 hours), and the fact that the catapults are put out of the poor defensive perimeter they created and that made them shoot just 2 times !!!! Then having launched a group of light riders (the dothraki) in charge reveals perfectly how little DnD think in terms of realism (I ask for a bit not so much), the dothraki as I wrote in my old post are almost completely useless in a head-on collision and above all against an enemy that has no loss of morale. Finally I talk about the fact that THEY HAVE LEFT THEIR ARMY OUTSIDE THE WALLS, I don't know about you but since the 8x02 episode I realized that it was an idiotic choice made by DnD so that the army of Jon and Daenarys were torn to pieces, this thing makes me pissed off I can understand the shock value for the viewer and while the battle of the 2.0 fire camps (lannister versus dothraki) was not very realistic (various reasons including light cavalry dothraki would have been completely broken by a solid line of spears) it was enough to make it enjoyable, but the battle of the great winter is and will probably remain one of the most stupid battle scenes ever conceived on TV.

I withdraw everything I said in the last phrase 

MY TOUGH ON THE EPISODE ( I will be scurrilous attention)