#these parallels...

i am so sorry it took me so long to get to this but hey :D Mumbo Post :D and honestly you've brought up a lot of key moments for him already but hell yeah i get to expand on them

yeah mumbo is... he's a really strange one, that's for sure. at first, mumbo is very obviously in over his head, being inundated with things like grian and scar trying to get him to form an alliance, so much advice on "do this" "don't do that", etc. my favourite last life quote to this day is still a session 1 quote: impulse telling mumbo, "this is last life. we don't put that kind of effort in here, you'll be dead next week.". like... fuck. what a hard-hitting quote. so jaded, compared to mumbo who's really been thrown in head first here.

but mumbo really comes into his own in later sessions: arguably, he gets too into the chaos of the series - you can certainly tell cc!mumbo has some repressed rage from hermitcraft, lol. mumbo has, in some way, been responsible for the southlands getting into some form of chaos in multiple sessions - never mind grian, i would argue mumbo is the wild card of the southlands. because grian knows what is feasible for last life and what not to do because it will get you killed. mumbo has no such self-preservation instinct, and when he does obtain self-awareness he elects to ignore it. like you said: the ghast farm. his later decision to use the ghast farm to create end crystals. the multiple instant-death traps that he rigged the base with. he just accepts being taken hostage. he seems to get involved in almost every heist that they pull and is terrible at escaping. the list of things he's been involved in never ends, honestly.

he's just unpredictable in general, really; like you said, he was practically jumping at the chance to betray - even kill - his friends for a life. the thought didn't bother him at all. after grian left, he didn't just decide to blow things up, it was specifically to build fatal traps. he'd obviously completely come to terms with potentially killing grian. and then when grian comes back to yellow he's still overjoyed that they can be friends again - i don't think mumbo is insincere about his friendships or anything, just that he relishes the chance to cause some problems. honestly, i don't think he'd even be mad if he turned red. his response to grian attempting to kill him was not to escape and completely dismiss the idea of turning red, but to accept it only if grian took him out fairly - and, yeah, he didn't want grian to just randomly attack him, hence the sign. if he was going to go out it'd have to be on his terms. though i think you can also make a case for mumbo making this deal with grian purely because grian was just not going to stop otherwise. either way, mumbo very very very clearly wants to blow things up this season.

he also... really, really loves psychological warfare. don't forget he was the one responsible for suspending yellow snow above lava to try and barter for the enchanting table, not realising until much later that he'd made a stupid decision antagonising scar for no reason. he just sees the opportunity to cause problems and goes for it.

despite all of this though, mumbo is quite the indirect player, i've noticed. he often keeps to the southlands' general vicinity, and especially doesn't venture many places on his own. he specialises in traps and other indirect forms of kills (again, obviously stemming from cc!mumbo's peace love and plants bit). he's a very very dangerous player right now, especially if he gets the boogeyman curse, but i think that danger is going to lessen as pvp fights begin to break out more easily towards the end of the series.

Both their mother died when they were young.

Loved their wives a lot, who either left them of died.

Became stern after this. Though tywin was always stern.

Had 3 kids - 1 daughter and 2 sons.

Both were poor fathers. We know about tywin, but Viserys had no concern for Naerys when he forced her to marry Aegon.

Both their son's joined kingsguard.

Both were Hands by the age of 20 and very good at it. De facto rulers.

What say you popcorn?

Hi there! 🤗

I must confess I am not a fan of parallels, or of saying this character is just like that character. On the one hand, if that was the case, George would be doing a pretty bad job as a writer by giving us characters that are redundant, or copies of each other. On the other hand, most parallels that people use are so weak and general that they can apply for any two characters (e.g., has their house's look, has a son/daughter named X, had X children, loved to fly, had a paramour, lost their mother...).

Here let me show you how easy it is by showing you the "parallels" between Daemon and his son Aegon III. There are quite a lot of them.

Both married a Targaryen and a Velaryon woman (i.e., Laena and Rhaenyra; Jaehaera and Daenaera).

Both had three daughters and two sons (i.e., Baela, Rhaena, Aegon, Viserys, and Visenya; Daeron, Baelor, Daena, Rhaena, and Elaena).

Both lost their mothers when they were young.

Both were sons of a very famous prince (i.e., Baelon Targaryen “The Spring Prince” and Daemon Targaryen “The Rogue Prince).

Both had a brother named Viserys with whom they were close in their childhood (such closeness in their adult years was only maintained between Aegon III and his brother).

Both had two sons that became kings (i.e., Aegon III and Viserys II; Daeron I and Baelor I).

Both had their claim at one point challenged by a woman, and both later married that woman (i.e., Rhaenyra and Jaehaera).

Both had a very unfortunate and unhappy arranged first marriage (Daemon with Rhea Royce and Aegon III with Jaehaera Targaryen).

Both were skilled fighters.

I can even add, both were dragonriders, and Targaryens on both sides.

See? Quite a lot of things, but do they matter? Are they deep? I would say no, they aren’t. I used Daemon and his son but I could have easily picked other characters. And I will challenge anyone right here and now to send me characters for me to draw parallels between them. This is juts to show how pointless most parallels are. 

Now are they all irrelevant? No. I believe George himself has compared Dany to Aegon the Conqueror, and their parallels are relevant, and go deeper than irrelevant things that really say very little if anything about two characters. This to say I don’t hate or dislike every two parallels, I just started to grow a deep distaste for them when I start seeing dumb things like:

“Culinary skills”, “Son named Joffrey”, “Loved to Fly” I die a little on the inside.

Comparing now the parallels between Tywin and MVP Viserys.

Both their mother died when they were young. - This is true of such a great list of characters I don’t consider it relevant. It would be like “mother died in childbirth”. Small list of other characters who lost their mothers when they were young just from the top of my head: Aenys, Viserys I, Daemon, Aegon III, Baela, Rhaena, Jon Snow, Daenerys, Cersei, Tyrion, Jaime, Harwin Strong, Larys Strong, Aemma Arryn, Rhaenyra Targaryen, Brandon Stark, Rickon Stark... these are just the ones who instantly popped out.

Loved their wives a lot, who either left them of died. - Tywin was always stern, he was only “happy” with Lady Johanna, yes it got worse after she died but the bar was already low. Meanwhile Viserys II was a charmer who enchanted everyone before Larra left him. Also by stating either “died or left them” I feel it’s forced and not actually the same situation. I would say it would be the same situation if both had been left by their wives, or if both their wives had died.

Became stern after this. Though tywin was always stern. - As you say - very correctly if I might add - Tywin was always stern. If Tywin didn’t really change I don’t find it an accurate parallel.

Had 3 kids - 1 daughter and 2 sons. - Again such a shallow comparison. Back to Daemon and Aegon II who each had 2 sons and 3 daughters. Were they similar? No. 

Both were poor fathers. We know about tywin, but Viserys had no concern for Naerys when he forced her to marry Aegon. - I feel we need to learn more about Viserys and his children before making such a strong statement because we know so little. And being a poor father is true of so many characters - Aegon I, Jaehaerys (sometimes), Viserys I, Balon Greyjoy... 

Both their son's joined kingsguard. - This yes, though in one case it was his heir, and in the other, his second son... not exactly the same situation.

Both were Hands by the age of 20 and very good at it. De facto rulers. - Actually we can’t say this. We don’t know at what age Viserys became Aegon’s Hand. I believe he only did at the end of his brother’s reign but we might need to get back to this if F&B II ever comes out (yes Popcorn making jokes at this hour lol).

The most relevant parallels that I see between Viserys and Tywin would be that they were both considered to be some of the best Hands in the history of Westeros, and both had a daughter who was queen and rumoured to have an affair with her brother who was a knight of the Kingsguard. Where it matters though, I consider Tywin and Viserys to be quite different.

Tywin was someone to whom the ends very much justified the means (i.e., having babies murdered) whilst Viserys II wasn’t that sort of person. Was he that sort of person, he would have gotten rid of Baelor even before he became king and just ceased power for himself. Certainly I can’t see anything that he did that could even be comparable to what Tywin had done to Elia and her children. Another key difference between them was how Tywin was raised for rule (being his father’s heir) and learned from his father’s own mistakes, since Tytos was a weak man. Viserys, on the other hand, was his mother’s youngest son out of five and his father’s second son. He wasn’t expected to ever become king. Both of his parents were also formidable people, none could be called weak by any chance. Let’s not forget Viserys’s mama and papa was the Rogue Prince Daddy Daemon and Rhaenyra Targaryen the Realm’s Delight.

About their daughters while we know the rumours about Cersei to be #facts, about Naerys we know them to be slander Aegon IV tried to throw her way, since nowhere is there something that would lead anyone who has reading comprehension to suggest that she and Aemon were indeed lovers. And another key difference is that Cersei’s line will end, whilst Naerys’s line didn’t and in fact both the Targaryens and the Martells we see in the current asoiaf books have her blood. Not to mention that personality wise, Naerys and Cersei are polar opposites, and maybe drawing the anti-parallels between them would have a LOT of merit as they are more than just skin deep.

Finally we have their deaths and how they came to be, which I think are also worth bringing up. Tywin was killed by Tyrion, and Viserys II was rumoured to be killed by his son Aegon IV. If the latter is indeed true (we don’t know for sure, I have some doubts), this would be a key parallel between them. But... here comes that but again...

While Tyrion’s actions were very much not justified but... we know where he’s coming from and from a very emotional and ignoring laws and ethics for a moment, Tywin earned what he got, Viserys did nothing to Aegon IV, that we know of, but being absent and stern and cleaning after his sh:t the best he could. Again, certainly I cannot image him doing anything of the sort of what Tywin did to Tyrion. If he had, I am positive the history books would have let us know.

So in sum, I see nothing between them strong enough to justify an “Omg they are so similar to each other”.

Funnily enough, we hear Tyrion speaking very well of Viserys II. Not really relevant to the topic but I will leave this right here because we stan MVP Viserys.

All this aside and I really enjoyed this ask, Anon. I got a lot out of my chest not gonna lie here XD and this was a really interesting question.