SirSamuel

HAPPY PRIDE! 🌈

“I was told Your Grace had need of me,” Ser Justin said, from one knee. “You will escort the Braavosi banker back to the Wall. Choose six good men and take twelve horses. Oh, and take the Stark girl with you, as well as Alysane Mormont. Lady Arya should have a female companion. Deliver her to Lord Commander Snow on your way to Eastwatch." Stannis tapped the parchment that lay before him. “A true king pays his debts.” - Theon I, Twow

"Speak the word, and we will send you to the Black Pearl or the Daughter of the Dusk." "I sold three cockles to a courtesan." "Which one was this, now? The Queen o' Cockles, was it?" "The Black Pearl. She said 'I'll take three cockles,' and 'Do you have some hot sauce, little one?" "And what did you say?" "I said, 'No, my lady,' and, 'Don't call me little one. My name is Cat.' "Look, the Sealord's box. That must be the Westerosi envoy. Have you ever seen such clothes on an old man? And look, he's brought the Black Pearl!" She was so lovely that the lamps seemed to burn brighter when she passed. - Arya, Affc, Adwd, Twow

He is a man of the Night's Watch, she thought, as he sang about some stupid lady throwing herself off some stupid tower because her stupid prince was dead. The lady should go kill the ones who killed her prince.

Daeron and Aerion in the early days

X

This was THE moment where Valentino’s entire character snapped into focus. NOT because of violence, NOT because of dominance, but because of BOUNDARIES.

Everyone spent the whole first half of the season painting Valentino as “the weak one,” the “scared one,” the one “under Vox’s thumb,” like he was just this pathetic wet cat clinging to his terrifying TV boyfriend, and this episode proved beyond doubt that Valentino was never physically powerless, “too scared to fight back,” or physically beneath Vox. HE COULD HAVE DESTROYED VOX AT ANY TIME. He is terrifying when he wants to be. He rips the man’s HEAD off like he’s removing a stubborn jar lid. This is not someone who is “too weak” to defend himself.

The gag is this: He didn’t. BECAUSE. HE. LOVED. HIM. That was the line he wouldn’t cross. Hurting Vox (seriously) was the one thing he would not do. Until this scene.

Because THIS, AND THIS ALONE, was the thing that finally crossed Valentino’s boundary. Not Vox yelling. Not Vox controlling him. Not Vox being arrogant or cruel or bigoted or insufferably smug. No. Valentino doesn’t freak out over any of that, because that’s just “Vox being Vox.” He’s lived with that for years. He knows that version of Vox. He’s built his life around that version.

What he cannot handle, what cracks him open, is Vox finally admitting, out loud, that he does not care if he lives or dies, essentially saying “I don’t care if I die as long as Alastor goes down with me.”

Do people understand what a HORROR that is for Valentino?

That is the exact moment he realizes: “Oh. You don’t care if YOU survive. You don’t care if WE survive. You would trade your own life—AND MINE, AND VELVETTE’S—just to settle a seven-year grudge.”

THAT is the betrayal. The betrayal is Vox giving up on EXISTENCE. The betrayal is Vox saying “You don’t matter enough to keep me alive.” The betrayal is Vox saying “WE don’t matter enough to keep me alive.”

And THAT is when Valentino stops being gentle. He tries, obviously, he reaches out softly, and it is the softest this man has ever been, and Vox SHOVES HIM AWAY, and that’s it. The moment Vox rejects the olive branch, the moment Vox chooses oblivion over their bond, Valentino flips from heartbroken to survival mode.

Not because he stopped loving him, but because loving him is EXACTLY why he refuses to let Vox kill them all.

So he does the one thing he’s never done before: he hurts him. He yanks his entire head off, violently and decisively, not out of anger, but out of sheer terror that the man he loves is trying to die.

This whole time, he wasn’t restrained because he was weak. He was restrained because he cared.

And the ONLY thing that finally pushed him past that restraint was the realization that Vox would rather annihilate himself—and everyone around him—than let go of the stupid deer vendetta.

This is not “Vox being Vox.” This is Valentino realizing: “Oh. You stopped choosing life. And if you stop choosing life, I have to choose it for you.”

Valentino’s not naïve. He didn’t “miss the red flags.” He walked into the field, collected the flags, waved them around like parade banners, and kissed the man holding them. He knew EXACTLY who Vox was, and he still said yes.

Valentino doesn’t rip Vox’s head off to win. He’s not trying to dominate him. He’s not trying to “put him in his place.” It’s literally the opposite. He takes Vox’s head because he has NO OTHER WAY to keep him alive.

Also let’s talk about the symbolism because YES, IT’S SYMBOLIC.

Vox loses his HEAD. The part he thinks with. The part he plots with. The part he obsesses with. The part that is STUCK on Alastor like a looping broadcast. And Valentino literally rips off the part of Vox that wants to die. Valentino and Velvette are left holding the part of Vox that matters most to them: the part that thinks, schemes, talks, curses, teases, obsessively obsesses over them. The part that defines him as Vox. The body, all the posturing, the brute force, the physical dominance? Not necessary. Gone.