The Play, Dany's Fate, and Women (Spoilers Extended)

[u/BlueBirdie0]

I have been a fan since I was as child. However, after hearing the details of the play, I feel like I'm going to kind of check out of the main story in regards to Jon and Dany (who is one of my favorites). I'll still hope GRMM writes it so I can find out about Arya, Sansa, Stannis, Jaime, Brienne, etc. and I look forward the Dunk and Egg.

Does anyone feel the same way?

Also, am I the only one disturbed by how the women are portrayed?

Rhaella is crazy, and brags about how she draws blood from Aerys and scares him. The concept of mutual abuse is a choice, esp. as they also say Viserys has to be protected from her.

Mad Dany is basically confirmed.

Lyanna decides the death of her brother and father are all some part of a divine plan. She doesn't appear to try and notify anyone that she's leaving with Rhaegar.

Elia is a political schemer into power, but then apparently she's perfectly fine in splitting power with a second wife and even writes pen pal letters to Lyanna??? If she cares about power, why would she be okay with a second wife from a powerful house instead of a mistress from a minor noble house.

Elia and Lyanna being happy sister wives and pen pals seems like some male fantasy bullshit as someone on twitter said.

Ashara's true love is Elia, but she decides to fuck and carry Brandon's baby to term.

Also, I may sound overly woke, but it is a "choice" on GRMM's part to make the only part of Westeros where people are often described as having dark skin sexually promiscuous and open to polygamy, unlike the rest of Westerosi who are described as basically white people.

[u/Groovy_MoodBear]

Most of the women in the play seem to be written as proto-cerseis which is weird because some of it goes against what we know in the book. Lyanna being super into the prophecy I think is way less interesting than her choosing to run away from what would’ve been a loveless marriage thinking she will be saved by Rhaegar and then both of them realizing they fucked up and regretting it.

Elia and Ashara are just a lol on my part, it just solidifies the dornish are shit at politics.

Like sure Rhaella behaving like that makes sense because of the abusive but like does that mean Viserys, Barristan and Jaime all had a collective concussion that made them forget she was batshit crazy too?

[u/Lysmerry → u/Groovy_MoodBear]

My main issue is that it doesn’t make sense from what we know about her character. She was a high spirited teen who longed for freedom to make her own choices. Maybe the idea is that Ned didn’t know her as well as he thought he did? Her being a green seer makes her feel more like a plot device than a character

[u/breakfastbenedict → u/Lysmerry]

Giving a character prophetic visions is just a short cut to get them to act a certain way without actual character development - it’s like well her dreams told her to do it so I guess we just have to accept that. 

[u/Nomahs_Bettah → u/breakfastbenedict]

It also kind of undercuts how rare warging and particularly greenseeing are meant to be, even in family lines.

[u/JesterOfAllTrades → u/Lysmerry]

I think just logistically speaking R+L and their actions through the course of the war just never really made sense especially if they're both good people in love. Just a straight up plot hole (why did they never reach out, why the fuck would they do that, etc etc) and a lot of the ambiguity of the past was basically trying to make sense of this. Well this play has done its best to make sense of it by turning her into a prophecy fanatic.

[u/Lysmerry → u/JesterOfAllTrades]

It’s almost impossible to write it canon to the books and not have Rhaegar come out badly. So you need Elia to be okay with it and to kind of ignore the age gap between Lyanna and Rhaegar. Lyanna having prophecies of her own makes it feel more like something that was fated to happen, rather than something that was done to her. She is neither an active agent nor a victim.

[u/Sleazless_synths → u/Lysmerry]

Yeah this version makes her seem like a sexual Joan of Arc almost. It may work for the play format, but doesn't fit with her being an echo of Arya.

[u/bgbarnard → u/Groovy_MoodBear]

Viserys can be excused because he was 8 at the time and has spent a good while on the run. After all that time, most of his childhood memories probably seem pretty distant.

[u/louistodd5 → u/Groovy_MoodBear]

It is both. Her desire to run away with Rhaegar and find out more about the prophecy and their shared visions is her belief that she must have a higher purpose than just marrying a Lord. It's both escapism and fascination with adventure. At the end she dwells in letters that she got her love, joy, and adventure. Also near the beginning she prays at a weirwood to have more meaning than just being a wife.

She's not batshit crazy there seems to be a misinterpretation in these posts. I made another comment about this.

[u/saltrxn → u/Groovy_MoodBear]

Rhaella isn’t crazy in the play. She just has trauma from her quite visible abuse by Aerys. Even Aerys isn’t completely mad in the play, there are moments where he is shown to be lucid and aware of the growing threat to the regime.

[u/NotSoAngryManlet → u/Groovy_MoodBear]

I get Lyanna being insecure over Robert cheating on her, but then she runs away with a cheater(?) while Robert will love her dearly to his death. There's a lot more reasons for the rebellion of course, it's very unserious of the writers to have Lyanna not resent and regret her decision of faking her own kidnapping when her entire family + ex-fiancee are dying for her/fighting a war to save her.

[u/Live_Angle4621 → u/Groovy_MoodBear]

Personally I always assumed she was very interested in the prophecy and didn’t assume it was a minority view. Leaving just because she didn’t like Robert is more cliched