Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 157 — AFFC Samwell II

Episode Date: March 25, 2022

Sam's travel playlist starts with Phoebe Bridgers's "Motion Sickness" before transitioning into Avril Lavigne's "My Happy Ending," all as covered by Dareon.  Also!  Upcoming collab with Direwolf City to discuss The Righteous Gemstones season 2! Catch us live Sunday evening EST on Youtube: Find us Sunday at:  Arah's Channel, where Chloe joined to cover Euphoria: https://www.youtube.com/c/ieatzebraarah  This Gray Area's channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3dNUeJ3jGZ3vixcQf4KSlg   ---  Eliana's twitter: https://twitter.com/arhythmetric Eliana's reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/glass_table_girl Eliana's blog: https://themanyfacedblog.wordpress.com/ Chloe's twitter: https://twitter.com/liesandarbor Chloe's blog: www.liesandarborgold.com Intro by Anton Langhage  

Hello, and welcome to Thrill's Gone Canon Reads A Song of Ice and Fire, Episode 157, Samwell 2 in A Feast for Crows. I'm one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts, Eliana. Thank you everyone for being here with us this week and thank you very much for being understanding about last week. Yes, we had to take a quick break with some family stuff going on at both homes homes but we are back in action on a boat we're on a boat with sam gillian amen ready for some grief yeah actually we're prepping for grief and learning a little bit about it amen's giving us a primer before you know we grieve for him oh my god eliana and i have gorged on grief we've had our fill you know but yet here

we are ready for more we are yeah that's why we keep rereading these books oh my god well before we get on that boat and skip on down through skagosi area those horrible waters we're going to talk about let's do a quick chat about what we're doing this month patreon episode coming out this month for patrons in the stranger tier and above yes patrons of the stranger tier and above get bonus episodes every month and this month we are doing something that eliana and i are so excited yes probably wrongfully excited we're probably such nerds uh march shroom it's march shroom madness mushroom the testament of mushroom right our testimony of mushroom here we are going to talk about mushroom and his role in targaryen

history because i have a feeling hot d might not i wonder yeah how they're going to incorporate him right because he's such like a presence for the dance of the dragons because we get a lot of it through some of his accounts in Fire and Blood. But I'm sure we'll see him maybe. I don't know. But I'm excited to talk about Mushroom, March Shroom. We're going to talk about him. We're also going to talk about real life mushrooms and consuming them.

But not like the psychedelic kind, like the culinary kind. But I guess you could use the psychedelic kind culinarily, but it's not like, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I'd rather dehydrate other shrooms, but I mean, like, we might talk about's not like i don't know yeah i mean i'd rather dehydrate other shrooms but i mean like yeah we might talk about those two you don't know yeah so we'll find out we'll find out that episode will be out by the end of the month for five dollar patrons and up thank you so much for subscribing to us and pledging to us on patreon we've had a lot of fun over there

getting to do some weird episode ideas if you haven't checked it out we've been doing a series on the free cities we're hitting our last two soon we're saving them though for this year for for reasons for reasons we're saving them for reasons but you'll hear about them when they're coming out yeah i think we have like the last two are big ones you know volantis and bravos so we're going to bravo soon ourselves here was indeed that's so true so true so true bestie well if you're a patron of ours and if you're in the thunder tier and above the ten dollar tier and above we actually have a private discord server members get private discord access faux life faux life we aren't going to kick you off you're're our fam. And every month we do brunch slash happy hour. You just missed ours, right?

We just did it last week. Sorry, but you can come next month in April and we'll have more info on that soon. This month, I'm excited. We're actually recording the day before brunch. So I think we're just going to play a bunch of Jackbox games tomorrow. I can't wait to just be silly, talk about A Song of Ice and Fire and His Dark Materials and kind of see what our patrons have been up to this month indeed

it's gonna be a very relaxed brunch we need that I think we need that yes and so some things have changed this month again because of our swapping of episode release dates in lieu of this being released last week, we put out our Patreon episode covering the novella from the His Dark Materials series,

Once Upon a Time in the North, which follows Lee Scoresby and Yorick Burnison. But we are moving a little bit regarding the release dates of our His Dark Materials episodes for this month. Yeah, just to get back on track we will have our next amber spyglass episode out on april 1st best day of the year best day of the entire year the best human ever to be born was born that day it me uh yes we'll be releasing our next his dark materials episode on the first we'll resume with sam for the rest of the month and you know we might uh try to bring the his dark materials back to the right track i'm guessing in may we will be at the end of the month we'll probably be coming right back into into style into fashion but we will be at

ice and fire con at the end of april so more to come on our schedule for April. Yes. Yeah. April 1st, it is a no joke that Chloe was born that day. You are so funny. Eliana, how can I deal with someone so clever and good looking every week? I just don't know. Chloe's like, I've heard this joke like a million times, but whatever. Whatever. March through. That's why YouTube kicked us off.

They were like, you could be funny or you could be beautiful. You can't be both girls. Oh, my God. uh oh speaking of youtube at some point we are working on uh we will obviously announce a date for when that happens but teaming up with direwolf city to talk about the righteous gemstones at some point yes praise be to she i can can't wait. Love those girls. I was on with Ara over at her channel, Ara Eat Zebra on YouTube doing Euphoria reviews with her and sometimes Gray, this Gray area and you once, believe it or not. Yes. You were there and you were there and you were there. That was a blast for season two. Those videos are there. Maybe we'll throw a link to Ara's channel. You should check them out if you were into Euphoria. You know, the show with the good music. That stuff. It was a fun time.

What was that? That's labyrinth, man. It's labyrinth. Oh my god. Watch Euphoria. That's all I have to tell you guys about this show. Oh my gosh. Yeah.

So we'll keep you all updated when we cover the righteous gemstones which i am looking forward to it's just again things are hairy right now in terms of timing so like an ibanese sailor yeah but speaking of timing let's uh let's breathe through some of these moments in this story yeah lightning round time aria one a arrives in Braavos to the House of Black and White. Cersei 2. Cersei heads to the set for Tywin's Wake, where a middling level of incompetencies take place and is rejected by her uncle for Hand of the King. Jaime 1. Jaime rejects Cersei for Hand of the King. Again. Brienne 2. Brienne reaches Duskendale and obtains a new shield.

Sansa 1. Merlion haunts the castle, locked up for his quote-unquote crimes. Peter has some haters. Sansa coddles Sweet Robin, cause someone has to. The Kraken's daughter. Asha awaits her supporters before the Queen's moot. Including her most loyal suppo- sorry, no, I'm sorry, I meant her most annoying supporters. sorry no i'm sorry i meant her most annoying supporters tristopher botley the hile hunt of ash's plot at least he grows so i guess there's that but i don't know i don't know i don't know about him i don't know jury's still out circe three circe throws a rager for tommen's wedding to marjorie most pleased by wildfire and Oraine Waters' resemblance to Rhaegar. The Soiled Knight.

Ahri's Oakheart has been having dirty, dirty sex with Princess Arianne and has now hit a crossroads. Save his pure golden princess or keep getting his dick sucked. What will he do? Someone help me figure it out he goes the same route as like sammy like i could drown i could die that's cool at least i'll keep having little deaths until the big death you know yeah brianne three brianne finds what seems like a new lead through nimble dick crab and that brings us over to sam to a feast for crows adventures stink wait wait shit i'm sorry that's the wrong book same message it's the same exact same chapter same chapter sam has been sick this entire trip

at the beginning he was like i have a queasy belly but he also kind of has a fear of drowning too so that's not helping he has to stay brave though especially for gilly the moment they left the shore she had begun to cry whispering gods be good to herself the book like specifies that it's not the ocean that like really causes the sickness it's you know the motion of the ship and it's true it's true though this is how motion sickness works um that's that's all i have and phoebe phoebe bridgers is playing in the background that's the song darian's singing

it's not the size of the ship it's the motion of it in the ocean eliana says take that's literally what georgia wrote i do uh i do have to say phoebe bridgers is the musician one right

Phoebe Waller Bridgerton god damn it's Phoebe Waller Bridgerton no no it is Phoebe Bridgers it's so confusing I feel like I had never really heard of many Phoebes for a while and then all of a sudden there's like a million Phoebes it's the Spiderman meme

when it comes to the actress versus the musician and I don't know which one is which Phoebe Waller Bridgerton but you need to figure it out you need it's very difficult with different kinds of bards the north had disappeared bit by bit from them and the wind was coming up sam reassured gilly but she only held her baby tighter and fled from him so sam finds himself hurling off the boat at the gunwale which makes him think more about drowning as a young boy his father had thrown him in the pond beneath horn hill to teach him to swim he had wheezed for hours until sir hyle

pulled him out sam never goes into water deeper than his waist after that and would you know it when you're out at sea it's definitely deeper than your waist and the water's also full of rocks and whirlpools that could kill him as well it reminds me of the the move the whirlpool move that was in the og pokemon games that you had to get to be able to go up like whirlpool and waterfall stuff. That's what it reminds me of. They really didn't bring that back a lot after a few of the gens, I feel like. But it was only useful in two areas. That does remind me of

using Whirlpool, and Sam doesn't have a Pokemon that could do that for him, which is a bummer. He does not. Actually, this stood out to me because it's the only mention of Hyle in Sam's plot. So in a way, I know we almost liken Sandor and Joffrey's relationship kind of to, you know, like he was stuck watching over the kid all the time. So there had to be some sort of idolatry going on.

And it's weird to think of Hyle and what effect he could have on Sam, right? Or what influence he's had on Sam's life growing up. It seems that he might have been one of his father's men that was always around. It does make me think that like when he was, you know, trying to impress and get with Brienne, he actually was very smart, right? He gave her a book, a beautiful book with beautiful illustrations and tales of knightly valor. He brought apples and carrots for her horses and a silk plume for her helm and he knew the things that brienne wanted and was interested in as a lady and some of those things are not unlike what sam is interested in

right with books and knightly valor stories and knightly valor it makes me think that maybe heil does have some kindness somewhere in his heart, like one bone of kindness in his heart. It's probably the only good thing Heil's done, right? Like saving Sam's life, giving Brienne a book. Those are probably the big things he's done great in his life. But he is, weirdly enough, like the text completely connects him to Darren right after this. And the description of Darren darren right after this and the description of darren that we get after this mention of heil they kind of both seem to share some of the same traits right like kind of handsome assholes very self-sure and i don't know interesting considering we just

got heil in the last chapter right with brienne yeah there was something it wasn't the book there was something that we like gave i guess heil credit for during the Brienne chapters, but clearly I didn't internalize that, so Hyle gets, like, two cookies for everything that he's done in his whole life, you know? Sure he's out, sure he's out. Yeah, that's interesting likening him to Darian, because I don't know, like, I do feel bad for Darian. We can talk about it more later as we get more of darian's story but darian's like an asshole but i do feel for him yeah i kind of feel like he's the the garris drink water of this trip yeah like i mean garris drink water i guess he you know he wasn't forced to join the penal colony for darian i I'm like, that was pretty unfair.

There's a lot there, but Darian, he's fair-haired and hazel. Asks Sam if he's looking for mermaids, and Sam says no, but he doesn't actually know what he's looking for, and it's not being a maester, though, that's for sure, or leaving his only friends or facing his father. None of these things are the things that Sam is looking for in life. I will say that we're going to pass Skagos, right? Sail by it, this chapter. And between that and then Darian being like, are you looking for mermaids? It makes me think a little bit of the Manderlys. Like we're kind of being primed to be like, the Manderlys, right? And I don't know that it really means anything. It's just kind of like

atmosphere and being like, put this in your subconscious because it's going to come up. I definitely will come back to this because there's more than just this in this chapter. Manderlys are definitely scattered around just atmospherically. That's a great way to put it. You can feel them coming in the plot. Or Varys, who might be a merman, according to some theories. And I think he actually is kind of in this chapter, too, because we're going to talk about some baby swapping right oh oh yes very true very true well sam hopes and thinks it's going to be different for them right gilly's going to be warm well-fed living a dream as a servant at his

father's castle happy watching her son grow up to be a huntsman, a stable boy, a smith. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Sam. Samwell. Samwell, honey. Is this not just Tyrion and Shae in A Clash of Kings? Is this... is this not... it's not, right? It's obviously not because their line of work is very different. However, I got so many tyrian vibes from this chapter from first of all penny and tyrian right being on the ship right now in a dance with dragons completely parallel to this but also sam is like hey this is a step up for you gilly i'm gonna let you be a servant and sam is like there's something interesting that he has this class status that he doesn't really always realize that he is able to move between the two, being a brother of the Watch.

But also he's still a Lord's son, even though he was supposed to have his last name erased when he went to the Watch, right? And we're seeing that be a huge theme for many of these men of the Watch, whether it be Aemon or Jon. Sam can shed his blacks and be a Tarly as he'll see throughout these books he could shed his blacks and technically be a tarly and save her with his wealth which he's using that in a really good way to use his class to protect gilly but she could never do the same right like she can't move between these classes and i'm sure the bad show kind of played with it when they actually do go to horn hill in the show but i'm sure that we'll see something that will further highlight and illustrate that. And I was rereading some of those Tyrion chapters in A Dance with Dragons with Penny.

And there's a ton in common with Tyrion's journey. Sam doesn't know about the baby swap yet, so he doesn't understand Gilly's attitude. Tyrion, on the other other hand does know why penny is laden with grief right they killed her brother because of tyrian and it's not really his fault but it also is his fault entirely you know it's like both even the language is great he says you know can i be of help and she says no and then it's quick as that she was gone again retreating back below to the cabin she shared with her dog in sao not unlike gilly fleeing right from being above on the ship and the sailors also think that penny is bad luck

because she's a woman on a ship let alone a dwarf on a ship and gilly is no different they look at her as we'll see as an abomination and just the guilt between the two. It's very interesting seeing them in such a similar position once more. Absolutely. I think that's a great, great comparison in regards to how they're able to weave between class. And I mean, even like Arya, right, is kind of able to do so as well. She can go into different places and navigate different places that she wouldn't necessarily be able to. And Sansa, their stories are part of that. But I really like the comparisons Yeah. it's unlucky to have them on the ship and i'm like i don't think it works like that i don't think that's how ships work but okay okay that's not how the weather works but and and yeah and the projection where sam just kind of assumes right that this will be better for gilly but as we know for multiple reasons it is not yeah well it wasn't good for you when you were in your

father's house was it you think yeah gilly have so much in common do you think maybe she will really not have a great time there and also she doesn't know anyone right same as how sam doesn't want to leave his friends or loved ones and gilly did do that right she left her auntie mother sisters yeah again hyphens between all of those um but i mean those were the people that she knew she's alone in the world and has now left her son even more alone now yeah sam continues to make these assumptions for other people right he says and maester amon's going to go somewhere better as well warm breezes at old town talking yeah fucking heaven. Yeah, it actually does sound like a great way to go, but having ruined his rest a hundred times over? Sure, sure. And Darian could also be happier. He claimed to be innocent of the rape that sent him to the Wall, and now he would have that chance, recruiting in Yoren's stead, who had been presumed vanished and dead.

He is dead. We all saw that. Yeah, Joran's dead and Darren's gonna be too. Rip. The voyage would be long and rough. No one could deny that. But for the others, at least, there would be a happy end. That was Sam's solace. I am going for them, he told himself.

For the Night's Watch and for the happy ending. The longer he looked at the sea, though, the colder and deeper it appeared. Yeah, so if you've been paying attention, you know there's not a happy ending. I'm waving the sausage. No, I'm not. Stop waving the sausage, Eliana. Sam is dispelled, though, right, of these illusions about happy endings and his nevada about this by the end of the chapter. And I do appreciate, right, that it is easier for Sam to come to terms with making this journey if he knows that he's the only one who's really going to suffer, right? He's willing to sacrifice his own happiness.

And I think that's very much part of Sam's goodness. He's doing it for the other people. And I think that makes him quite similar to Gilly, right? He's willing to sacrifice his own happiness. And I think that's very much part of Sam's goodness. He's doing it for the other people. And I think that makes him quite similar to Gilly, right? Like, she's, as we all know, she is giving up a lot right now. And she's doing it just to save this other child. And as we know, like, the further

Gilly sails from her son in the Night's Watch, that's the further she gets from her happy ending. And Sam doesn't realize until the end of this chapter. Darian does not get a happy ending. He is killed by Arya. You liken Darian and Euron to their deaths. Both of them are related to Arya

in a way. And Aemon never really gets... Yeah. Same little girl around there and Aemon never really gets to enjoy the warm breezes of his youth because he dies on the ship. Yep. Well, not on the ship, but you know, on this journey, on the way there. Gilly whispering, gods be good. I don't know that we really get anything in this chapter that really tells us that Gilly is actually afraid of the water and drowning, especially not after that reveal.

She's afraid, right, of leaving her son behind. So that's a lot of Sam kind of projecting his fears onto Gilly and telling himself he's being brave for her. But it's really for himself, which is good. Do it for yourself, Sam. Gilly is bastard brave. Exactly, exactly. Nothing frightens that girl.

Except for the safety, I guess, of her own son, but she's got a... If she looks back, she is lost. And so, as we find out, right, they're going in this other sea, right? Sam thinks everyone's going to get their happy ending. Reminds me of the saying of sailing off into the sunset and that is not what they're doing they're not sailing off into the sunset not the sunset sea either and that made me realize like oh maybe that is aria's ending i don't really know but i guess that would make sense of sailing off into the sunset like would george do that he would do that he would do that on purpose i do think that it leaves it open-ended

for her especially i mean it's nemeria you know sailing off trying to find solace a better place after having watched all of these people her friends family members you know people that she finally found go through horrible traumatic stuff i imagine will happen i imagine there will be some trauma in the last two books of the series. Maybe that's just me. Even more than she's already had, yes. Yeah, yeah. So I imagine that it'll be like neatly written. But I could see that.

I could see the whole sailing off into the sunset. I actually really love these lines, right? Like it's just such a very sad passage of like, for the others at least there will be a happy end it actually reminds me of the avril lavigne song i think it is the maybe it's not so much for my happy ending is that avril

yeah yep it reminds me of that oh i love that little note thing right there like the where it like resolves god that's sexy the dissonance dissolving from a song anyways sorry sorry sorry we got sidetracked uh yeah i don't know it's a sad line and it's sad because sam goes from being a little more hopeful and optimistic about some of these things to being hardened and more realistic about them after this right he becomes a little more hardened from it it is very a very akin to sansa's story for example of sansa taking off those rose lenses and sam realizes he has to now too yeah absolutely and we'll we'll get there in. But first, down in the cramped cabin, Sam realizes not looking at the water is actually worse.

And yes, that makes sense, right? Your body is disoriented from the motion that it's feeling. Seeing the water or seeing your movement, this works in cars too, helps align your brain. He tries to talk to Gilly to take his mind off of things, telling her he'll find them a ship to Oldtown and that he had read of Braavos when he was small. The city was built in a lagoon on a hundred islands

with a stone titan. Hundreds of feet high and boats instead of horses and mummers who perform real written stories. And the food he carries on talking about oysters and the shows he hoped they could see between waiting for a ship. But it doesn't excite her.

She peers at him through dull eyes, saying, If you want, my lord. And that's what she wants, and she says nothing and turns from him. Sam, stop being blind to your girlfriend. My god. If he wasn't, maybe he would have known what was going on as we find out from Eamon. Yeah, he's too wrapped up in an in his own bullshit you know to really realize it yet even the language reminds me of a little bit of Cheyenne Tyrion here with the Malord

action going on that like that formal if you want Malord that's interesting very interesting yeah absolutely this next scene is so hard dude they go the trip is this is a big travelogue right like this chapter we're able to cruise through a lot of it because it's a travelogue and it goes on stirring more puke out of Sam's belly

who blows chunks into the oncoming wind and yet he's like it's all over me but I feel better yeah well and as he's gonna say at some point he's used to the smells going on now that everything stinks really badly so you know i think the the puke he's like whatever it's my own stench i guess yeah i get motion sick i don't not from like i don't know not from boats maybe but it Not too much from boats, but I do get car sick really badly. And I used to like go up on trips with my parents, three-hour trips every few weekends to see my grandparents.

And I would want to read because it's three hours and you're bored as fuck. And I couldn't. I would get so sick. Oh, man. I used to be able to do it pretty well reading in cars and stuff but not so much anymore i'm better at it now i'm better at it now than i was as a kid i don't get as sick you know where your finger and your thumb meet that little pad between your finger and your thumb yeah there's actually like a weird little like nerve muscle right there, if you press it, it'll help with nausea. I learned that trick,

and that has helped me a lot. The more you know, everyone. The more you know. So we received some info on the Blackbird, the largest of the Watch's galleys. It's not the fastest, though. That would be the Stormcrow and Talon, lean, fighting ships. Blackbird was better to brave the rough waters near and beyond Skagos, though. Winter storms are bad, but autumn storms are more common. Yeah, those other two boats aren't great to travel with because they're more open, and you have to have a ton of men rowing them, right? And I do think that we're going to see more Stormcrow in action in the future. Talon's actually the one that got taken to go to hard

home by cotter pike and the stormcrow is the ship that ends up finding the wreckage of the ship we see at skagos here as we pass later in dance they find that wreckage the name of the ship is interesting though right it may be this is just we need a book but i wonder if because it's stormcrow if we'll see that ship again in action because it reminds me of euron uh so it'd be interesting if it comes back in sam's plot and is used like to go fight euron or something i don't know also makes me think of the stormcrows like the sellswords and mercenaries absolutely there's like something there i don't know what it is yet but the name stands out and I was like kind of racking my brain like, what could it mean? Well, so the other thing I was thinking was with the storm crows, the actual storm crows themselves.

It makes me think of them. And I don't know, it makes me think, you know how like all these people from the plots that get exiled get exiled and run mercenary companies? Yeah. the plots that get exiled yeah get exiled and run mercenary companies yeah it just makes you think maybe it's somebody started the storm crows once and it could have been you know somebody that was exiled to the watch or whatever i was thinking like is it a sort of i don't know ship kind of name like not this kind of ship like a relationship kind of name for like denarius and john because she's storm born right the storm and then he's a crow is this the boat and she is gonna conceive the boat baby storm crow maybe oh that would be that would be interesting even i'm really not kidding like maybe i know i was gonna be used

with them and they conceive the boat babby i know you're not kidding and i'm like yeah i don't know maybe or like they definitely could fuck on the show again it's about the motion of the ocean I think that you all heard this theory here first that Storm Crow means that this is the boat Danny and John fuck on Eliana you're brilliant your brain is just so big

I was on the metro and I'm like what do I do what does it mean and I'm like am I getting motion sick i don't know so the first 10 days were calm cold but the air was bracing and salty sam couldn't eat and i tried to keep gilly courageous but she wouldn't come on deck no matter what preferring to huddle in the dark with her son because she's depressed not her son I guess he too is puking often and shitting retching up her milk

and then we have a line of no matter how many tallow candles Sam lit the smell of shit persisted truly the imagery is painted on pretty thick I can smell the air myself the gross baby poop and the puke and like baby

poop has this sickly cloying sweetness to it because babies are idiots and they can't yet digest real things right into their poop so like this is not a great environment to be hanging out with i get it i wouldn't want to hang out there either very gross very You know, it's sad that Gilly is she feels safer in that gross-ass room than she does up there. And, you know, able to be sad on her own in there. Or does she not feel she deserves to be up there, right?

Where the air is fresh. Maybe she's like, I've done something cursing by leaving my child, and she deserves to be down in this darkness or something. Depressions like that sometimes. Exactly. Just depression,

right? Self loathing for what you've done. She had no choice, but yet. Yeah. It's also like just the smell. I feel like this is just what George is telling us. Ships are really like, right?

Because it's reminiscent of Tyrion's ship adventures. Granted, he shits himself in a barrel. So that a that's a little different but also kind of the same and you're going to talk about this a little more but also quentin's realization that as you said also up top adventure stink it does oh yeah this is definitely sam's adventure stink chapter poor fuckers well darian kept the open air pleasant at least with the singing uh he's got all these different songs like sad ones like the day they hanged black robin the mermaid's lament and autumn of my day rousing ones like iron lances and seven swords for seven sons body ones like milady's Supper, her little flower,

and Meggot was a merry maid, a merry maid was she. While he sang, the Baron the Maiden fair, all the oarsmen joined in, and Blackbird seemed to fly across the water. I want to focus on Mary Mag's song, because that's gotta be about Mary Mag,

Aegon Forth's second mistress. And I didn't really realize the tune that it probably is until you just sang it, but Maggot was a merry maid, a merry maid. It's like Mary had a little lamb, but it's Maggot was a merry maid. I didn't think

of that, but I'm like 90% sure that's probably what he's thinking. So way to go, Eliana. I didn't realize I was singing it i was just reading things aloud so wow it it must be he was must be channeling that you were almost hamilton rapping it you know and i think that's what brought this on for me i was like whoa she's past patiently waiting passionately smashing maggot the merry maid uh so mary meg Meg at the Merry Mode. So Merry Meg was the second of Aegon's mistresses, a buxom wife of a blacksmith. He bought her on the road for seven gold dragons and put her up in a secret house.

And they had a secret wedding ceremony and secret children. Later, Viserys II puts an end to it when he's prince. He's like, okay, these children are going to go become septas with the faith. And Meg, you need to go back to your blacksmith husband meg ends up dying within a year beaten by her husband to death because that's on domestic violence and that's what that was i actually really like that complexity and that i love when the woman gets beaten and dies in a story you know it just really my god story uh but i actually like the meta of it is like that is it right like that's what happens there there's something about this though that again brings to mind shay in some

aspects with the secret manse with the secret children and the secret wife yeah uh his golden shame and pride for hands of gold cold uh but also gilly this is what sam is proposing to do right to put her in a secret little place where no one's gonna know who she or her son are and she can work for his family and he'll provide for her secretly on the side sam stole her in some aspects from her home as we've talked about right and secretly married her with the cloaking by stealing the free folk girl if he didn't buy her but you know good good song choice here i think that's a really good song choice to kind of just illustrate some of what gilly's going through and having i mean meg obviously didn't really have any say

in what was happening to her when she was stolen which gilly at least gets a little bit of a say and she also didn't have a say of when she was pretty much given back to her awful husband yeah and i mean you were talking about that risk of domestic violence right and like that was definitely part of why alice ann got rid of the right of the first night and we can see like how that shows up here but also that was as we know a risk for gilly in running away uh thankfully her father is now dead so yeah her abuser sorry her father husband yeah jesus well and that's the other thing like that's what she would have been returned to had her escape not gone okay and had her father not gotten murdered had everything not devolved like that's what her life would have been returned to so it does make

me think of that domestic violence that she suffered and there's another song choice i want to bring up uh was what you were saying earlier talking about manderlees coming into the plot the mermaid's lament is a song that darren's saying and a lot of these songs i was looking at them a handful of them were created just for this just for this passage i don't think uh iron lances and seven swords and my lady's supper her little flower oh it's about sex those ones were made up just for this some of the other ones like black robin and the bear and the maiden fair obviously are songs that we've heard before in the story uh but i feel like mermaid's lament reminds me of alongside this

what's happening at the same time with wyman in a dance with dragons and what he comes to do that we know between you know the battle there that he kind of went all out and was like well probably gonna die so may as well be crazy and charge these frays in fucking battle. Yeah. After cooking him up. I have now a more complex view of House Frey after doing a series about them. But yeah, absolutely. I feel like there's a lot going on here with that title, right? The Mermaid's Lament. Like, on one hand, is it about...

Is it a song about the Manderlys having to leave their home by the Mander? Maybe they're lamenting that loss. But also we know that in the context of the actual story, Wyman Manderly does have a lament, right? He's – one of his sons died during the Red Wedding. So obviously that's something that he's lamenting and kind of wants vengeance for too. So it's like a double – there's a lot of meanings in that title. I do love the other titles though, too.

Because when you look at them closely, you can see that it's actually illustrating this journey that Sam's taking, right? Seven Swords for Seven Sons doesn't, isn't too dissimilar from the song he sings to Gilly that our wonderful friend Noah sang for us, right? That they sang for us. Oh, yeah, yeah. Reminds me of that song, of the Song of the Seven. And then you have body ones.

My Lady's Supper, which Gilly's not having any supper right now. Her Little Flower, which very soon we know what's going to happen there with Sam. They're going to have some- Sam's Little Flower. Yeah, Sam's Flower, really, in this scenario. Bear and the Maiden Fair, also about sex. Magat Was a Merry Maiden Fair, also about sex. Magat was a merry maid is probably also about sex. So we know

what's coming. Ha, it's Sam. But we know what's coming for Sam soon. Ha, it's Sam. Ha. Well. Until then, Eamon had once called Darian's voice honey poured over thunder.

That's a really nice compliment. He played wood harp and fiddle, wrote his own songs, though Sam didn't think they were that good. He's young, alright, give him time to get to Wonderwall shit. And we have a line here of, Still, it was good to sit and listen, though the chess was so hard and splintery that Sam was almost grateful for his fleshy buttocks. Fat men take a cushion with them wherever they go, he thought. As a fat ass-haver, relatable. Very relatable. I relate to this.

I feel like George is right. Have fun there. Oh yeah, this is George. Yeah, this is big George, right? Like, this is someorge yeah this is big george right like this is some george sass going on i like these little lines that we get from george that you know that he's like i'm gonna put something i want to put in this line for sam amen prefers the deck beneath a pile of furs gazing out on the water darren one time is in the background's like, I wonder what he's looking at, because he can't really see. And Eamon's like, actually, I hear you, Darren. I wasn't born blind, you know. I remember every rock, tree, white cap, and goal from the last time I came through at age 35.

He was a maester for 16 years at this time. Ag had called him to help his rule, setting him north on the Golden Dragon, having Sir Duncan, the tall Sir Duncan, see him to Eastwatch. No recruit had arrived at the Wall with so much pomp since Nymeria sent the Watch six kings and golden fetters. I really like that detail, and it's a fun reminder. You were talking earlier about, you know, like any nimerian aria story story but here as well right it's interesting to bring up nimeria leaving her home and the context of salmon crew also going on a ship voyage and i mean leaving their home too yeah for me especially the

gilly stuff sticks out so strongly there that like i mean this is also gilly is leaving to give a better home to her people whether it's her people or not and suffering for them by taking this other child that isn't hers and furthering the free folk so it really makes her the nemiria of this story in some ways of suffering for those people yeah definitely gilly is nemir is yeah that's what i'm saying yeah no i agree i like that a lot no one can argue with me here this is a gilly only podcast yeah uh egg had even emptied out king's landings dungeon so that amen wouldn't need to say his vows alone and then i called those men Aemon's honor guard, which is actually kind of nice, I think.

One of those honor guards was Brynden Rivers, who later became Lord Commander. You have this question from Darion of, Bloodraven? Beyoncé? Said Darion. I know a song about him. A Thousand Eyes and and one it's called but i thought he lived a hundred years ago well about yes he's actually it's interesting he's only 23

years older than amen i didn't realize that i was thinking about it during this entire chapter i was like oh he's only 23 years older than amen actually is but it's a great intro to blood raven in this book he's named for the first time in this chapter as brendan rivers to my knowledge like they don't actually call him brendan rivers outside of this chapter yet so it makes bran's arrival tie really nicely in having come from sam's arc and diverged from meeting sam at one point to go to him and it makes the dance with dragons kind of accompaniment really nice for bran and he's actually amen's great uncle did you know his great uncle he was uh he's a great uncle he's a great bastard oh my god it's true i mean no he literally was like

they were called the great bastards so well i'm personally a great bastard so i get it i get you're pretty great yeah thanks pretty great no joke coming back full circle you know darren is kind of a shithead and amon's like you know uh once i was even as young as you darren and once he straight up says he's like once i was even as young as you darren believe it or not darren doesn't darren doesn't he's like i don't believe you old man he's like you were born like that this seems to make amon sad when he says it though and then he closes his eyes and he goes back to sleep and there's something i've been thinking of about darian's character here all this history and these thoughts of coming back to some of amon's past and amon being a dragon and him remembering being a dragon it

actually makes you think about one of amon's brothers that we haven't talked about in a while which is his darren right his brother darren darren the drunkard the one that has the dragon dreams that we uh meet at the beginning of dunkin egg that darren's presence is making me probably making amon think about his brother his darren right uh they both had a little bit of sass they're both kind of sassy characters and they like music and booze. And Aemon serves as Daeron's maester for a time at Dragonstone, not unlike playing kind of like a Melisandre-esque character to Stannis in that kind of way when you think about it. He served as his maester, and this is where he went

when he thought it wasn't appropriate for him to be taking the Grand Maester place in King's Landing. So his relationship and the evolution of that relationship with his brother, Darren, and Darren's visions also come to mind. I know we talked a little bit, you know, last week about Rhaegar and him exchanging different messages and how he might have led Rhaegar to believe in prophecy. I mean, some of the prophecies that we first see in Dunk and Egg

come from Darren, right? Someday the prophecies that we first see in Dunk and Egg come from Daren, right? Someday the dragons will return, Egg later tells Dunk. My brother Daren's dreamed of it, and King Aerys read it in a prophecy. Maybe it'll be my egg that hatches. That would be splendid, Aegon V says. Gotta know. I think that Daren has a big, big part of amon's personality and amon's willingness to be interested in prophecy and and the mysteries and search more into these mysteries that he probably studied some of when he was learning to be a maester at the citadel i think his family helped spur that and i think darren is someone to think about so he's probably very sad thinking of his darren right now i agree definitely and maybe that's part of what spurs you

know like we start seeing that amen starts going further into his past in this chapter and it might be related to what you're saying here about darren darian darian i'm sorry but when you say darian i just think of the english yeah the english dog that's all i've been thinking of you keep pronouncing his darian. I'm like, oh, Darian. Darian. That was me as Chibiusa, thank you. Instead of Mamochan. Yeah, exactly. Chibiusa in the English dub

is like, oh, Darian. It's very funny. Well, the crew called the cat an Old Tattersall. That's adorable. That's my name. That's my new name on everything. That's so cute. Old Tattersall that's adorable that's my name that's my new name on everything that's so cute old tattersall it's like fish foot remember old fish foot yeah oh yeah fish foot i love it from davos there's your there's your uh parallel with the manderleys old fish foot old tattersall maybe it's just like the names sort of the old bit like and

you combine two words into one well kind, kind of like you were saying, there's some piratey shit going on here. You know, a little bit of Blackbeard and the Stormcrows. Old Tattersalls. Thinking that I'm not caught up yet. I know that like it just came out and there's not that many episodes, but like of Our Flag Means Death.

Yeah. Which has just premiered recently. So. I'm on episode two. I'm on episode two. I'm still in the middle of one. It's what we do in the shadows, but with vampires, you guys. Yeah, exactly.

It's tight for you, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or vampires, yeah, with pirates. Well, the crew calls the captain the old Tattersalt, and he's seldom speaking, wears faded stained blacks, and in the mornings they eat oat and porridge, lunch, peas porridge, a lot of porridges, and dinners, salt beef, salt cod, and salt mutton, washed down with ale. Darien sang, Sam retched, Gilly cried, Eamon slept. It was a better voyage than the trip that Sam had taken last when he was

10 years old, sailing on Lord Redwine's The Arbor Queen, which was five times as large as the Blackbird. It was magnificent. The ship was gorgeous, but once they hit the Queen, which was five times as large as the Blackbird. It was magnificent. The ship was gorgeous, but once they hit the water, he was sick as fuck to his father's disgust. Yeah, interesting that he took a very long trip up to the watch then, right? That means he went to the watch by horse, probably? Yeah, right? I was like, oh my god, they went over land. It's a long fucking trip.

So in the Arborbor things go from bad to worse the red wine twin sons don't like sam and they bully the fuck out of him and they shame him in the practice yard daily on the fifth day hobber had clad a serving girl a kitchen girl in his armor and lets her beat the shit out of sam until sam cries and then hobber reveals her to all the servants who are watching and everyone's howling with laughter it's just a horrible scene very much so reminiscent of some of brienne's horrors as a child right that we went through oh i was also thinking i think the language right does use the word how right in in the with laughter it reminds me a little also of howland reed and liana yep yep not unlike

that that's interesting because we talked about that a little last week he's little howland aww they're hoshara they did it except he's the one getting beat up by liana the liana figure so maybe not exactly but still but you know what that comes back with the aria chapter with him yeah when she beats him and she's like oh sorry i didn't fucking see you there okay so we have this passage the boy needs a bit of seasoning that's all his father had told lord red wine that night but red wine's fool rattled his rattle and replied i a pinch of pepper a few nice cloves an apple in his mouth thereafter lord randall forbade sam to eat apples so long as they remained beneath paxter redwine's roof that was amazing thank you amazing performance chloe from chibiusa to avril lavigne to this fool. Yeah, what can't she do?

So I don't know that George intended this. Maybe, maybe not. But, you know, besides the part where obviously Randall's forbidding Sam from eating apples because of the mockery and, like, reminiscent of, like, the roast pig stuff. Apples, though, are commonly associated with knowledge because of the Christian story, the Christian creation story that involves Eve eating the fruit of knowledge. And so like, there's a way that this can kind of be read, right? Of Randall forbidding Sam to bite the apple to pursue knowledge, but as a maester. I really like that because that is a lot of what he's forbidding for Sam. That's great.

That's really great. Huh. And now Sam feels forbidden to pursue carnal knowledge, but he's going to do it anyway. Good for him. Gotta get over your fears, Sam. No better way than to plunge into pussy. Yeah. When they had returned home from the red wine trip, his mother told him him you weren't supposed to return had he pleased red wine he'd be betrothed to his daughter and switcheroo with horace as cupbearer and page

she had comforted him murmuring my poor poor sam sam thinks it'd be good to see his mother again and maybe she'd even be proud of him in his blacks he could tell her he's a man of the watch that his brothers even call him the slayer now he could even see dickon and his sisters but he might also see his father which makes him heave and ratch once more but this time the correct way with the wind he was learning until the blackbird struck east for the shores beyond skagos so it was like when it turns like does his like up trunk like hit him in the face again yeah i think the winds are in so many directions that you can't really call it anymore

yeah well we talked a lot about sam's trauma last chapter and all of the previous chapters but again here's randall acting as the barrier to sam's happiness and from sam pursuing knowledge and from sam feeling love sam just thinks he's unworthy of all this love or can't reach it because randall stands in the way yeah and because he was told you know you're unworthy you were even his mom like this is she comforts him but like it still is like poor poor stupid sam you were supposed to do a good job and not come home is what she said to him basically yeah i'm like his mom does coddle him a little in some of those aspects that aren't healthy either uh and randall probably doesn't make it much easier yeah that poor boy he's fucked it's similar to like how it makes me think and wonder more about

molessa's character and i'd like to get to know her more and see more of her story or learn more of what you know her and randall's relationship was like because it kind of reminds me of logan roy and carolyn roy interesting ex-wife and how like she's awful in the opposite way right of like being unable to go to action because of her relationship and who she is with him and yada yada so i don't know it just made me think of that very interesting i think that we will get more of that relationship and see her but i just you know don't know when i hope so though so i do think we will yeah allege someday so we have this quote the island sat at the mouth of the Bay of Seals, massive and

mountainous, a stark and forbidding land peopled by savages. They lived in caves and grim mountain fastnesses, Sam had read and wrote great shaggy unicorns to war. Skagos meant stone in the old tongue. The Skagosi named themselves the Stoneborn, but their fellow Northmen called them Skags and liked them little. Only a hundred years ago, Skagos had risen in rebellion. Their revolt had taken years to quell and claim the life of the Lord of Winterfell and hundreds of his sworn swords. Some songs said the Skags were cannibals. Supposedly, their warriors ate the hearts and livers of the men they slew. In ancient days, this Gagosi had sailed to the nearby Isle

of Skane, seized its women, slaughtered its men, and ate them on a pebbled beach in a feast that lasted for a fortnight. Skane remained unpeopled to this day. Ah, can't wait to see Davos go straight to Skane, right?

Somehow. I imagine we will definitely see skein now that i'm like the isle of skein something will happen that we see at some point up close there for davos and again it'd be interesting in skagos yeah yeah and again yeah that's the prominence with skagos in this chapter and a big reason of why it feels like we're in Manderly territory is that when we get this information again, it's in Wyman's Mermaid's Court, right? It makes me very interested, of course, with the Obsidian and Dragonsteel over at Skagos waiting for us. And I wonder if we'll have a good connection for Davos and Sam character-wise, right?

Because they have a lot in common. They're seeking higher education in some ways, and education in general. Their backgrounds are kind of them being unlikely lords, unlikely slayers, saving the children. And maybe Sam and Davos will eventually have to trip to Skagos together. I kind of think we won't go back to Skagos after Davos comes back. It might just be over. No more Skagos. But something interesting that their plots seem very connected with Skagos right now. Yeah. Or maybe like Sam, I don't know, on his way back gets like shipwrecked there and runs into Davos.

It would be funny if Sam like meets every single Stark kid. Right. Before Jon does and realizes they're all alive. Right. He's got, yeah, Bran, Arya. Rick and just makes sense for him to run into. before John does and realizes they're all alive, right? He's got, yeah, Bran, Arya. Rickon just makes sense for him to run into. It actually, then, with that in mind,

it does also make the argument for, like, Sam being the one to figure out, John, you're not actually technically full Stark, buddy. You know? I mean, he's not, like, as much Stark as they are. He's just, like, it's on the other side. You also are part dragon, I i think because i've met your siblings and they aren't your siblings dude yeah john all of them sam all of them he's like but

good news except for one all are alive and you knew about that one that one was pretty graphic dude yeah that one really affected you so darian knows the songs and stories as well joining sam at the prow as they near skagos joking they may see a unicorn and sam jokes back well if the captain's good we won't we won't go that close yeah and he says not to mention that out loud to gilly though she's upset enough and darian complains about her sobbing that when she isn't sobbing the baby is sobbing and when the baby is eating her nipple instead of sobbing she seems to be in pain and sam starts to think about it like that gilly is really brave she is really brave and that she had felt wretched later sam defends her saying that the sea must be scary and tells

darian that you know maybe if you play some lullabies for them maybe then they'll be able to sleep and darian says only if she shoves a pug up his arse and that he cannot abide the smell the rains began in the next days and sam at one point tells amen they should go below where it's dry but amen says it feels like tears asking him to let them stay and that it has been a long time since he last wept and i'm like okay roy mustang and i'm not saying that it influenced this but i am not saying that the manga didn't come out before okay only death i don't think only death can pay for life the quick lit exchange is is in this series, goddammit, in the very first book. It actually is. It really is. And when you bring people

back to life, they're not quite the same. So... Don't worry, you guys. You can hear all of this and more when we someday get to Daenerys to cover Fullmetal Alchemist, the chapter. I thought you were gonna say we're covering Fullmetal Alchemist. I'm like, that's a commitment. I don't know about that yet. Yeah, I don't have't know about that yet I don't have that kind of time with you

not yet Sam has no choice but to stay above with Maester Aemon and eventually the rain and wind becomes way worse finally he's like alright we gotta get below and he realizes Aemon fell asleep he gently wakes him Aemon's blind white eyes came open.

Egg, he said as the rain streamed down his cheeks. Egg, I dreamed that I was old. Sam, when am I gonna wake up? Sam scoops him up. No one had ever called Sam strong, but Maester Eamon was a little heavier than usual in his soaked black cloaks. However, he still weighed no more than a child. When he gets to the cabin, he sees Gilly was curled up in a corner with the babe, asleep, sobbing. The candles are all guttered out. He urgently asks her to help, and they get him into dry clothes. Eamon is damp and clammy, and Sam's like, we have to warm him. We have to warm him up.

And she helps, not saying a word, sniffling. He calls out that Darren needs to come help too and he goes to climb the stairs to find him. But the deck rises beneath his feet, falling away and he slams to the ground, which wakes up the baby who screams loudly and the ship rolls again. The storm throws Gilly into Sam's arms

and Sam's like, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. One day you're going to tell your son all about this adventure. And she digs her nails into his arm, shuddering and beginning to sob violently because it was the worst fucking possible thing he could have said in that moment.

How could he have known? He holds her tightly, feeling her boobies up against him. He kind of gets a boner and he's like, oh, I better shrug that off. But she clings to him harder, sobbing. The days after that run together. Everyone is starved, but too sick to eat. The captain brings out a cask of fire wine that they're all able to actually keep down.

So after a few days as they're moving, they see a shattered ship over at the rocks of skagos rocks crabs paying the dead crew homage on the sand old tattersalt said it's too close getting his rowers to exhaustedly row the fuck away from skagos and then they finally have eight days and seven nights of clear smooth sailing i loved that the eight days and seven nights. I'm like, oh, we went biblical on this for a hot second. Some smooth sailing. And I do have to say, I didn't really think about this, but that shattered ship is scary. It makes you wonder if Osha and Rickon

maybe narrowly avoided being dead. Maybe they had to jump out. Maybe that's them. No, I think it is their ship. Definitely. Yeah. Scary. It is.

Well, then came more storms. Worse than before. Three storms, maybe. Or maybe only one, broken up by lulls. Sam can't really tell, and Darian screams, What does it matter?! While he puzzles it out. Obviously it doesn't.

Sam manages to squeak, the thunder throwing him out. But not the babe or Gilly. And up top, old Tattersalt who has seldom heard, screams to his crew. This idea of like, is it three storms or one? It kind of actually makes me think of the war going on in Westeros and its different

turns. Right? The war starts with Tyrion's capture and Ned's beheading. And then we reach a lull, right? Sometime in a storm of swords and there's another one rising soon as we see in Feast the War of the Three Queens or who knows what it's going to be called

then we're going to have obviously the war with the others and maybe more wars and fighting afterwards but with such little rest in between it makes me think they're all kind of connected and flowing into one another. Are they really three wars or are they one? What does it matter?

I love that. That really illustrates, because this is a physical vacuum being filled from a storm, where you have a power vacuum from those wars. And I love the lull being the metaphorical, like, this is the lull between the next king uprising to take these people. And then you have, of course, the line, and then the the in the fucking broken man like and then the lord calls and the men break over to his side and now they are his it does feel like a sea storm that is a very great way to put it tying into like the broken man like again darian being of the lower classes what does it matter if it's once one war amongst like the high lords or three you know it's all the same to them

in terms of the the wreckage it's true sam repeats to himself he hates the sea that this ship is strong they will not sink he is not afraid very much fear is the mind killer going on there good mantra sam during one of these lulls he white knuckles the rail and he hears the crew muttering that this is gilly's fault that she and her child are abominations and they wouldn't drown if they rid themselves of her sam doesn't dare confront these super doodly dudes but he makes sure his knife is sharp going with gilly wherever and whenever she made water. Even Darren's starting to be a total asshole about Gilly, fighting with Sam a little bit about it, saying she needs a good spanking or a hard fuck. Close, just keep waiting. Going to drink fire wine with the brothers of the oars. Sam himself had gotten used to the

smell, but he was also starting to lose his mind because of like you know no sleep for a whole week finally when he sees amon awake at one point he says is there anything i can give her to stop the crying an herb a potion and amon's like i'm gonna give you some of my dank counsel sam here's my advice there's no fear in gilly's tears it grief. There is no potion for that. Let her tears run their course, Sam. You cannot stem the flow. And of course, Eamon has experienced the grief of having to leave his family behind and who knows what would follow for them. But also, this is Eamon giving Sam some of his first lessons on how to deal with grief and loss. Granted, of course, he felt a little bit of that, you know, from what he endured north of the wall. A lot of people died.

But anyways, Sam is going to need these lessons later for, you know, when Eamon dies. Yeah. Fuck. He's going to be full of grief. God damn it. I have gorged enough on grief. Oh, well, not yet.

We've got more chapters. Sam doesn't really get why Gilly is grieving, and Eamon nudges him towards the answer. The babe is Dala's son, not her son, and Sam is incredulous. Gilly would never have left the wall without her son. She loves him. What threats the Lord Commander made.

What promises. I can only guess, Sam. But threats and promises there surely were. No. No, that's wrong. John would never- John would never. Lord Snow did.

Sometimes there is no happy choice, Sam. Only one less grievous than the others. Oh. Well, Sam thinks of the trials that he and Gilly had suffered and wonders what had it all been for then? And you get that refrain of

no happy choices and no happy endings. If you think this has a happy ending, you haven't... No, I'm joking. Oh my god. Waving the oh my god waving the sausage waving the sausage i actually i like how you brought that up i was waving my hand this is kind of a a negative version of no chance no choice right like no happy choice no happy ending there is no choice, right? Like no happy choice, no happy ending. There is no choice. Sam feels helpless. He feels powerless to this. I think there's a lot of speculation around,

you know, whether or not Eamon knew. I don't think he necessarily knew what Jon was planning to do. However, he knows he probably planted the idea, right? eliana and i talked about this offline before and i think he knew he planted the idea especially in telling john well you know what you fucking have to do kill the boy it's like selena and ben in the last season of veep is what it reminds me of honestly is what kill the boy reminds me of when like ben looks at selena if you're a veepster you'll know and ben's like you know what you have to do. That's more over what I think it was, right? Like, Eamon, you created this monster, Eliana. Eamon looking at John and being like, well, John, you'll figure out what the right choice is.

You always do. And you will. And this is the choice that he figured out. And it's interesting that George doesn't tell us whether or not Eamon knows, right? Because it doesn't matter. And it's interesting that George doesn't tell us whether or not Eamon knows, right? Because it doesn't matter. He figured it out, obviously, because sound is something that he is very, very strong at now, since he has more time to be strong at that sense. weird throuple of what happened with baby john being born we don't know what was going on besides ashara was being used as a face placeholder right if john would look more valerian than he should when he was born but the line from amen of what threats the lord commander made what promises i

can only guess but threats and promises they surely were it reminds me of ned when he's fever dreaming when he he thinks when he slept he dreamed dark disturbing dreams of blood and broken promises. Like you pointed out last chapter, Gilly is totally Liana in that moment begging John to promise her, promise me you will find him a new milk mother. Promise me you will keep him safe. i'm more than positive some of those things were probably asked by liana especially when i think about finding a milk mother for baby john on the way back to winterfell who could have gone with them to give john milk the entire way was it or was it howlin's wife but some of these just feel so close to to what the rebellion stories were evoking

right the stories of old and what they probably had to go through absolutely i think that's a great those are great connections and it's obviously something that really ties john to to ned i mean again may not have been his biological father, but that's his daddy. Sam is finally coping with this realization. And he's like, oh, shit, this is horrible. He wants to scream and howl. And he realizes, no, no one's going to care if Gilly's son is burnt. If she burns Gilly's boy, who will care?

No one but Gilly. He was only Craster's whelp, an abomination born born of incest not the son of the king beyond the wall he's no good for a hostage a sacrifice for anything he doesn't even have a name i really wanted us to call out that line because i think it's just such a heartbreaking line and it's and it's so true right like it's a truth that gilly herself also knows sam is just realizing now but gilly has known that uh and you discussed also earlier like those connections between sam and davos but i think it's also there between davos and gilly right gilly is protecting the innocents at the cost of her own life but also unfortunately imperiling her own son,

which is kind of more of Jon forcing her to, especially because Jon is like threatening to burn her son if anything happens to Manta's son. And it's very, very not saving the innocents vibe there, Jon. But, you know, Gilly's son, even if she's the only one who cares about him, and even if he's not important to anyone else but her like again that question of what is his life worth against the kingdom everything yeah it absolutely i think that feels really important in the sam plot of having like save the children come up you know that and also the people that have actually have to save the children right like sam and gilly are being charged with keeping the child safe davos ends up going to keep the children safe whether it's

edrick storm and getting him out of there and spiriting him away which is what they're kind of doing in some aspects yeah uh they're edrick storming in there or also rickon right being brave enough to go into skagos and here they are doing the same thing going through skagos and that takes a huge amount of bravery. Most people would not get on a ship to do so. And that's interesting with Rikken because you know, Rikken is a prince just as allegedly this child is a

prince even though again the Free Folk don't work like that but being accompanied by a Free Folk woman Osha and Gilly as well. That sticks out very much. Sam goes to the deck to retch, but he's got nothing left to throw up. I know that feeling. The wind is in the sails, and the north, suddenly, everything is still.

He sees a scattering of stars, including the Red Wanderer, the one that the Free Folk call the Thief. That ought to be my star sam thought miserably i helped to make john lord commander and i brought him gilly the babe there are no happy endings darian shows up beside him feeling really optimistic and positive for once being the god the worst is done buddy and sam And Sandpoint South saying no. Lightning flashes, silent, blinding. The worst isn't done. The worst is just beginning. And there are no happy endings.

Cuts be good, said Darian, laughing. Slayer, you are such a craven. So I like that repetition of the gods be good. That's what Gilly says as they're leaving. You are such a craven. So I like that repetition of the gods be good. That's what Gilly says as they're leaving the North. And how it takes on different meanings here. But there's a beautiful line of imagery in there, right? Where it says the sea was black as glass. And that really struck me.

It's a very simply like laid sentence. But obviously, as we know, glass comes in many colors. was black as glass and that really struck me it's a very simply like laid sentence but obviously as we know glass comes in many colors for most of us living in real life our first associations with glass are probably like colorless clear i got glasses on my face but it's a great simple chloe doesn't she has perfect eyesight um it's a great simple line that is detailed enough to remind us that we are in sam's story right right? It's black as glass because it's black as dragonglass. And that's Sam's first association with it. And that shining of it. And then you have this really great, I think, dialogue that connects Sam's story with

Ariane's. Ariane sees a star in the same book and thinks of it as Nymeria's star. And she takes it for her own star and omen, right? of her own story rising towards this accomplishment that she's going to get whereas for Sam he takes the star that he sees he's like that's a thief and thinks of it as his own life and everything around it going towards sadness so Darian takes Sam's pessimism though as cowardice but I mean it's not right Same as how Gilly knows the outcome of what she has to do to save Mance's child. It's risk, it's pain. She's risking her own death and her child. And I mean, I would say that perhaps even knowing that worse is coming, that there is no happy ending, and going forward anyway to do what must be done, as opposed to running away, maybe that's braver than just going forward knowing that there's a happy ending yeah i think the bravery is one more step right that's bravery yeah the bravery is taking one more step and just keeping on going even in the face of all the awful and the fact that like even the storm that you know darren is so ready and happy and whatever to to like say ah we have something better on the on the way sam is ready to brace himself even

though it's not like optimistic anymore like he wasn't happy-go-lucky in the beginning he's ready to brace that bad embrace whatever storms up, which I think is a good way to be for him. Like, it's not Craven. It's just he's finally taking a little realism. It's not like the songs, you know? It's not a big, fun journey like the songs. It's not. It really does get worse.

They have no idea how much worse it's going to get. Happy ending. So much for my hand. That's not the song darian sings in bravado yeah that's a bop that is a bop you know you brought up ariana and i think that's such a great reference with that line that's my star quentin Arien says right yeah I actually think it's really funny that he doesn't realize like you also stole Gilly dude that's what that star means that's the thief and you didn't even you're not even you don't get it but it does make me think of another Dornish character as we kind of talked about a little bit at the top in that adventure stank this is a great mirror to

Quentin's first chapter you have daddy issues right father focus doran and randall uh you have a gross ass boat garris is kind of the darren in my opinion that they both have these like you know uh egos the self-assuredness kind of assholes but in some aspects like you were saying they have different place in the story than sam and quentin do they don't have the crown that those two have or the paper shield those two have in life so that's interesting to kind of compare them as characters and they're both dreaming of better places right they're dreaming of the old town wine versus the Dornish wine which I find an interesting contrast because of where they're going the reach versus

Dorn and they both have to get to where they're going to beg to find a boat to take them and there's this line in Quentin's chapter he had promised his father he would bring her back to Dorn but more and more he wondered if he was equal to the task I never asked for this he thought makes me think a lot of Sam of uh wondering if he's equal to the task and how am I going to keep doing this and how am I going to keep doing this and how am i going to take care of gilly and this baby and become a maester and amen oh my god and make sure darren doesn't fuck everything up yeah and they've got different like you know daddy issues going on too and i mean a bunch of people die on quentin's journey and story right including himself

but uh if you ignore the part where he dies prior to that, you know, it's a lot like Sam's, right? A lot of people die before he gets to his destination. And yeah, I think for Quentin, though, he just presupposed. He was like, this has got to turn out well. This is definitely going to turn out well. It has to, right?

There has to be that happy ending at the end. Whereas for Sam, he's just been so conditioned by his father that he's always going to let him down that he's just like, well, hopefully everyone else gets a happy ending except for me. Shit's gonna be bad for me. But now he's like, oh, shit. All bad. All the time. Always has been. Always will be. Always has been. Alternatively, Randall shows up. Are you winning, son? Oh my god. Did you see that combination to leave a little on a happy mode note for that meme?

Of like, my son is winning. They don't know my son is winning at the party. He's not. Sam's not winning right now, but now but he will sam will win he'll be a winner yes i do think there are good things for sam at the end of his story i think like gilly survives probably not great for their kid their gilly's kid probably probably dead but i hope for the best for him but i don't know know. Sam and Gilly, they'll be fine. Those kids will work out. He's going to have to help her through a lot of the horrible grief that, you know, everything is going to be brought to her from this dead kid life.

Therapy. She needs therapy. They both need therapy. They both need therapy. Holy shit. Well, you know know help us crowdfund therapy for ghillie and sam

you can go to www.gofundme.we stands for you know that's short for west rose instead of gofundghillie ghilliefund I don't know yeah we'll post a link on our social Or. Instead of. Go fund Gilly. Gilly fund. I don't know.

Yeah. We'll post a link on our social medias where you can find that. We're not really. But you can send your love towards her. And of course you can always subscribe to us. On social media. At Girls Gone Canon. C-A-N-O-N

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and let us know what you think about the recent episodes and what you'd like to see in the future or, you know, talk about your pets or something. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Someone hasn't sent us an animal. They haven't emailed us animal pictures in a while. future or you know talk about your pets or something i don't know yeah yeah someone doesn't send us an animal they haven't emailed us animal pictures in a while yeah we do have a pets channel on discord though so i i should stop being spoiled i'm there all the time speaking of discord we do

have a couple of things on our patreon first First off, patrons in the $5 tier and above, the Stranger tier and above, do get bonus episodes every month. And again, this month is March Shroom. Yes, March Shroom madness. And we have already hosted brunch slash happy hour for this month for our Discord level of patrons. If you're in the Thunder tier, $10 and above,

you have access to that for life. Next month, April, we'll be putting out the date, hopefully shortly in the next couple weeks, and we hope that you can come hang out with us for some fun get-to-know-yous and icebreakers and games. Dude. As always, I have been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I have been another one of your hosts, Aliana.

Old Tatterfoot. Old Tattersalt. This is a ship between like old Tattersalt and old Fishfoot. Old Tattersalt. I think that those two men had a steamy salty love story out there on the sea.

The storm crow themselves. And the merman. Oh my god. This is very sexy. We'll be back at Sam 3. can't wait to chat with you guys then bye oh tattersalt