Any predictions for The Winds of Winter?
Not the release date (last intel: not in 2018, that's all we know), but the content. What's going to happen? Who's going to die? Here are my brief guesses for some of the main characters:
Jon: Inhabits Ghost for a while after his human body's death (like Varamyr in the ADWD prologue), then gets resurrected by Melisandre. GRRM has said he always found it cheap that Gandalf returned hardly the worse for wear in LOTR, so I'm interested to see how Jon's different. In the show he seems slightly more carpe-diem, but it also seems like the show has mostly forgotten about it.
Stannis: Takes Winterfell (look up the Night Lamp theory if you're not familiar with it) from the Freys and Boltons, and holds onto it against an eventual siege by the Others.
Bran: The show has probably disproven this, but I still think he becomes a prisoner of the Others next to his uncle Benjen, because the Others can't kill a Stark for some reason.
Sansa: I think Harry the Heir turns out to be a nightmare, but Sansa learns to deal with him and use the power of the Vale to help the Starks in their fight to retake Winterfell.
Arya: I think she comes back to Winterfell and gives the gift of mercy to her mother, after seeing what she's become.
Daenerys: I think she'll have a longer experience taking over the Dothraki than in the show, and she'll fly west across Essos, laying waste to the free cities and setting the slaves free. In Westeros it will be completely unclear to everyone whether she's mad or not.
Tyrion: I think he will continue to fall into moral decay and after becoming a close advisor to Dany will encourage her "fire and blood" side. (Especially since she's his aunt!)
Theon: Something about "what is dead may never die, but rises again harder and stronger" makes me think he's coming back as a wight.
Victarion: Blows the horn and dies from it.
Cersei: I think Jaime will kill her, and fairly early on. I think Aegon will have the role she had in the most recent seasons of the show.
Jaime: I think he survives the confrontation with Lady Stoneheart and, disillusioned with both her and Cersei, leaves high society to lead the Brotherhood Without Banners.
Brienne: Someone has to die with Lady Stoneheart, right?
Aegon: I think he successfully conquers King's Landing. He'll eventually die by foolhardiness, but probably not for a while.
What do you all think? Anyone I'm forgetting?
Unfortunately after being invested for 20 years, GRRM's inability to deliver the story in a reasonable timeframe has made me just not really care about it. I can't avoid spoilers, so the series is basically just... ruined.
I don't think I'm the only one feeling like this.
Yeah, ditto... I'm secretly hoping George RR fails to finish the series at this point and Brandon Sanderson takes over like he did for Wheel of Time.
I think GRRM had said that his will stipulates that if he dies, the series will remain unfinished.
Which is kind of the same situation as him still being alive.
Ya know, it's been so long since I've read through ASOIAF, and I've forgotten about most of the theory discussions I used to take part in :(
I just want that one theory regarding the Doom of Valyria, Summerhall, the origins of the Faceless Men, and Dragon Eggs as tactical nukes to be true.
No no no and no. Mainly because I don't want it to happen, not that I don't think it would be a bad plot thread. She's suffered so much already that I just want her to have some peace and in a few years settle down with Gendry.
Other unpopular opinion: I don't want half of the very likely things you mentioned to happen because it'll wind up that we need an 8th book! Dany burning her way across Essos would take a book in itself!
My problem is that I keep trying to figure out what the point of Arya’s story is. She’s an original character, so GRRM must have had some sort of plot in mind for her beyond “she becomes an assassin and we see how it goes.” The Stoneheart thing is at least somewhat narratively fulfilling, as sad as it may be.
I always assumed that the point of her story was to avenge Ned Stark and bring the Lannister's to ruin as best she could. Hers is a vengeance story.
Nymeria also has that badass wolf army as well, that's just begging to be used.
I really don't think Arya gets a happy ending...
Tyrion is Dany's nephew? When did this happen?
There’s a fan theory that Tyrion’s real father is the Mad King Aerys, Dany’s father. (So I guess they’re half-siblings, not aunt and nephew... I must have been thinking of Dany being Jon’s aunt.) The World book says that part of the falling-out between Tywin and Aerys was that Aerys was taking unspecified liberties with Joanna, Tywin’s wife (and cousin) and Tyrion’s mother. The timing works out so that he might be Tyrion’s father.
Most people hear that and recoil because the father/son dynamic between Tywin and Tyrion is so well drawn. I personally think it’s okay either way, as there are some lines that take on added significance if Tywin is not Tyrion’s father. (In AFFC, Tywin’s sister Gemma tells Jaime that “Tyrion is your father’s son, not you”, although she means it more metaphorically. And at one point Tywin tells Tyrion expressly that “you’re my son because I can’t prove that you’re not.”) Also, I think there’s a metatextual argument for it: if you assume Tyrion is Aerys’ son, then the POVs for AGOT (reflecting GRRM’s initial vision) are (1) the Stark family; and (2) the three Targaryens.
I recognize there’s plenty of evidence going in the other direction, and I mostly meant it as a joke (which I screwed up anyway). But I still think it’s interesting.
I don't super love the theory, but it does help with that whole "the dragon has three heads" business. Especially if Aegon does turn out to be a fake Targaryen.
Ah, I was only aware of the reverse theory. I really like the idea that Cersei and Jaime are Aerys', with Tyrion being Tywin's only biological child, and I feel like it's supported decently well in their behaviors, especially with how much Cersei acts like Viserys and Jaime, Rhaegar.
I seem to remember a theory that Tyrion is the bastard son of the Mad King and Joanna Lannister. The really, really inbred Targaryen genetics being responsible for his dwarfism and other deformities. It gives Tywin another reason to hate him as well; not only did his birth kill Tywin's wife, but he carries the Lannister name and defiles it, as opposed to carrying the bastard name Waters.