poppin' raindrops

obviously this will never be confirmed either way but my personal headcanon is that otto had daeron sent away to ward in oldtown because alicent simply wasn’t coping. after the time skip in s1 she is already hanging on by a thread, you cannot tell me she wasn’t deep in postpartum depression and rage at rhaenyra when daeron was born (and it was probably an unexpected pregnancy given the gap between aemond and daeron!!)

One thing I really didn’t understand is that when the Blacks took “Daeron” hostage they just… left Tessarion with the army? Like would you not want to kill the dragon that is bonded with one of Aegon’s heirs? Is it just me or was that kind of crazy? It does not seem in character for Daemon to just let the dragon go even if he believes that he has captured her rider. Thoughts?

my favorite thing about the greyjoys and the iron islands at large is how utterly delusional they are. like we get theon’s chapters in acok and you’re like wow theon you are so weird and entitled and delusional but the ironborn are All kind of Like That. that greyjoy delusion is inherited babey! and it ruins his life! the ironborn’s whole THING of being strong feared raiders who live by the Old Way balon especially crowning himself king TWICE is so silly and disconnected from reality like no one CARES about the iron islands and their problems except for the iron islands. i think there’s a line in one of theon’s first chapters about how the iron islands live in the past because the present is too bitter to bear. and then you have ironborn characters like asha and rodrik “this dream of kingship is a madness in our blood” the reader who Know the old way is dead and that integration with the rest of society is the only way to survive but that’s so much lamer and harder to hear than “We Will Be Kings Again We Just Need Dragons This Time!” quellon got rid of the old way outlawed thralldom and wanted to make alliances with the mainland balon said fuuuuck that I love the old way #myoldway and rebelled and lost everything and asha wants to try for modernity once again but she can’t bc the ironborn lords suck and want to believe her crazy uncle will make them rich instead of dealing with their painful irrelevance and lack of resources. pendulum swinging back and forth with each generation and the isle’s circumstances are still as shit as ever<3

"Average ironborn has two braincells" factoid actualy just a statistical error. Average ironborn has 0 braincells. Rodrik the Reader, who lives in a Book Tower and knows over 30 letters, is a fuckign nerd adn should not be counted

you do have to respect the show taking an entire episode to ask actually what IS Rhaenyra Targaryen’s tax policy and the answer being “Uh oh! Turns out Viserys never taught any of his children how to count”

I’ve been framing this as “Viserys didn’t teach his heir and/or spare anything” but like what did Viserys do successfully? ​Three dumb bitches saying “what would you have me do?” to no one in particular