Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 193 — AGOT Arya I

Episode Date: July 14, 2023

ARYA READY, KIDS?????!!?!?! We're starting a new POV with a familiar face. Also: with a special word from our sponsors A big big thanks for our outro this week to Warren, Steve, Madeline, Cassidy, and Pete --- 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/ Eliana's Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/arhythmetric.bsky.social Chloe's twitter: https://twitter.com/liesandarbor Chloe's blog: www.liesandarborgold.com Chloe's Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/liesandarbor.bsky.social  Intro by Anton Langhage

Hello, and welcome to Girls Gone Canon Reads A Song Of Ice And Fire, episode 193. Are you one in a Game of thrones i am one of your hosts chloe and i am another one of your hosts eliana and yes i will make this joke maybe even every week who knows but are you ready oh my god captain i can't hear you i I know, Captain. Wow, we're here at the beginning of Something New, Something Beautiful with Arya Stark. I actually, it's really weird to think that we're here because, you know, we did Sansa very early on in our career, I would say. And we knew that to balance it, we couldn't just have Arya next. And that's why we talked a lot about Arya there's some little hints for you secret diggers

out there on the POV reveals right there aren't any secret hints well this is a secret hint though like because analysis wise like especially Sansa and Arya I knew I could pepper it on fucking heavy because Arya wasn't gonna be until eight years later right that's kind of

that was my thought at the time that we could have Arya wasn't going to be until eight years later, right? That's kind of that that was my thought at the time that we could have Arya with Sansa and not miss Arya for so long. That is true. And yeah, part of why we didn't do Arya right after Sansa besides the fact that we thought I don't know, a we don't want to compare the sisters to one another like that. Well, obviously compare them a little just because that's how the chapters are are set up but honestly you know on a metal level especially when we were you know this is some behind the scenes now that we're five years into this at our wood anniversary tomorrow is actually the 12th anniversary of the release of a dance dance with dragons not to you know so tired i'm so tired oh sorry uh anyways we wanted to make sure that people got a taste of like what this sort of order was going to be like so we did a

couple of shorter povs right up there at the front sansa was that was also a hint yeah one of our first long ones but since then like that hasn't stopped us from putting long ones next to each other. But at the beginning, we didn't want to put two such long POVs right next to each other. I mean, I think everyone knows what's left, which are mostly long ones, except for a couple of short ones. So with that in mind, not a lot of remixing can be done. Yeah, I guess that part- Try to figure it out, good luck. Part of it is because those big ones

do go together, a lot of them, but also part of it was just like- I mean, it is saving some of the best for later, but it was also, you know, when you put things off all the time. Procrastination, yeah. For years. It's educated procrastination.

Oh, putting something off for years. Oh, 12 years even. We could put it off for 12 years if we tried hard enough. I'm gonna be honest with some of these big hitters. We're gonna be in Aria for over a year. Maybe we'll combine, you know, this month, for example, it's July in

23 if you're listening as this airs or in history or in the future wherever you are wherever you are in time and space listening to girls gone canon uh we are skipping sailor moon this month and we are actually going to do an aria episode at the end of the month for that last friday because there's a lot of aria episodes we might double up here and there or do a couple of episodes we could go the opposite direction and split them up and stretch it out even longer you know some podcasts like to do that maybe they do four parts on one aria chapter you know maybe someone should do that we it could be us we actually literally could probably we'll see we'll see let's not get crazy

chaos not to like feast dance dance, the Winds of Winter. Yeah. And hey, we have a Winds episode to do again, right? We have Mercy in the Winds of Winter that'll be on Patreon sometime in the next year and a half. Keep your eyes peeled for that one, patrons. That's true. That is, I think, our only, yeah, our only Arya Winds chapter that's out now. That's a wild one. You haven't read that one, right? No, I have. I have read that one.

I'm sorry. I'm a bad girlfriend. No, I think so. Because Mercy came out, I don't think I really read the ones that came out before I started really getting into the books and stuff, if that makes any sense. And I think Mercy came out when I was like already kind of involved and i was like obviously i'm not gonna not read it when everyone's talking about it it was that i'm like what are some of the top big releases that the elaine chapter when season five was bad um that was a great drop that one right there was ooh sizzle the other one that I also think lit the fandom up was the drop of Jaehaerys and Alysanne, or Alysanne, sorry, at the wall. With fire and blood.

That was another good drop. Oh yeah, and the Forsaken. Which we did last month in June for our Patreon episode. Because, you know, if you are a patron of ours in that stranger tier and above you get bonus episodes baby bonus episodes yeah this month also in honor of these aria episodes we and also summer you know summer vacation we're going road tripping we're actually not but chloe has done that recently My stuff's going road tripping. Yeah, cross-country, cross-country Cuban-it.

Yeah. We've done a little traveling this summer, this year for some of us, one of us. And maybe there's some traveling to come for us, but we're going to talk about everything road trip. Right? It's going to be a casual discussion. We'll talk about Arya. She goes on a pretty crazy road trip, and we'll chat about the aria episodes maybe some behind the scenes info on how our episodes are going and uh road trips and media right like

i don't know i like the idea of these great journeys being taken these mystical journeys and magical journeys reading the grisha verse and there's a lot of journeying around in that lots of, you know, like Avatar or Korra, fun stuff happening there, we'll chat all things road trip I mean, as you prepare for your road trip I'm not going on a road trip you can listen to ours, everyone is

everyone's going, maybe you're going on a sky trip maybe not a road trip, but a sky trip a big jet plane the travelogue is you know a long long long tradition of storytelling and there's a new i haven't seen it yet and i think it's a road trip movie i've only seen the trailers i don't want to see too much of joy ride that seems really cute um that came out this month with our girl our girl ashley park and we love from i mean i guess you've watched what the mean girls musical i have not yes and amelie right isn't she an amelie oh yeah yeah stephanie shoe

from everything everywhere all at once is also in it um so yeah ashley park also from emily in paris amelie i'm petty that's what you were trying to say with amelie i get it now i i'm sorry i i mispronounced it it's amelis in paris i love that show it's coming back soon i heard hold on you watch i made you watch that i'm so sorry i heard that it was based on a fan fiction or something. Oh, that's cool. Of something. Or it was a, I can't remember what I heard, but I feel like I read something recently

that it was kind of like a fan work that was turned into a TV show based on something. And I can't remember what. And I have to, I have to figure it out. That might've just been a haze. That might've been a Google drunk tunnel. So we don't have to talk about that. But someday I'll come back to that. Just wait, it'll come back.

It'll be don't delete it, Eliana. Keep it in because someday I'm coming back with this one. Maybe someone will email us and tell us we don't know. Yeah, absolutely. And they've been doing that a lot with a couple of things recently. A lot of movies and shows are based off of, I think, like The Kissing Booth, right? Isn't that based off of like a, not fan fiction, but you know, like fan fiction, but not that kind of fan fiction. Yeah, fan guess it's an iffy topic. I know George doesn't love it. It's an iffy little topic, but it's interesting all the same. You know, you look at the, the cheap tastic EL James and Twilight world having spawned one another. I don't know, maybe maybe it's our big break. Maybe the fanfiction we write on this podcast every day. Just kidding. But um, yeah, but MLS in Paris, speaking of, you know, by Darren Star, you started another Darren Star show, the the show,

the the Yes, I am. I forgot that. I didn't really realize that's who did both of them I'm not that wrapped up in it I just want you to know I didn't really know I'm taking off guard here for this yeah Emily's in Paris is also by Sex and the City creator Darren Star and younger creator I never finished younger

I didn't realize that yeah and he did Melrose Place I think i don't know anything about that show i watched it when i was i think my mom watched it when does it take place what is it even about it was in the 90s era uh is it a historical fiction no it's modern but it's in the 90s it's from the 90s and oh my god i can't believe my mom watched that show my mom said that my gossip girl show was garbage and she watched that huh anyways and she watched passions and days of our lives so you know what wait a second yo i had a dream that gossip girl like the second iteration that we did

an episode on came back oh my god that's so Pretty Little Liars of it. Did that happen to you? Pretty Little Liars? I don't know. Well, like, the killer comes back. It's like a, it's a culture joke. We're a pop culture podcast. We are, actually. That's what it says in our description. Listen, we got two last things before we get this fucking show

on the road. Thanks for listening to us blather. We're excited about this new POV. I hope you enjoyed your intro to her. God. Saturday, July 22nd, from 3 to 5pm,

Eliana time, ET, phone home, on our Discord for patrons in the Thunder tier and above. We're having a brunch slash happy hour where sometimes we play some Discord games and have some get to know yous. Thunder tier and above. We're having a brunch slash happy hour where sometimes we play some Discord games and have some get-to-know-yous. Thunder tier and above, $10 and up. If you're interested in the Discord, it's a really

fun place. There'll be some actually some touting of that at the end of the episode, so stay tuned. We have a very important message from our sponsors, from our patrons. Actually, yeah, our sponsors. Literally, we are sponsored by our patrons. That's actually. Actually, yeah, our sponsors. Literally, we are sponsored by our patrons. That's actually true.

It's a true fact. So without them, I have nothing to doom scroll on the Discord every day. They are my everything. They are my morning, my middle of the day, my night. You know, when I'm lost, I open the Discord app and I scroll, and there they all are chatting about usually the most ridiculous things or sometimes, like like really good things like powerful things actually always powerful but they're powerful people come hang out with us

yeah yeah so yeah that's happening and yeah we really opened up this aria episode i think we just took the long way to get to the episode just like aria's taking the long way back to winterfell but you know sometimes different roads can lead to the same castle, Eliana. Actually, yeah. And speaking about the same castle, this is not a good segue. I'm sorry. I thought you could do something with it. No, no.

It's my fault, not yours. Oh. Yeah, I wanted to talk about- I love you, Road 23. You should have reigned her in! Speaking of reigning people in uh as many of you know i was a reddit moderator on the r a song of ice and fire subreddit and um yeah so i don't know i just wanted to share with some people as we're revisiting the beginning of the series with the

game of thrones and also some of the beginning of like and we'll touch on this later the things that i loved in this story with Ari's character. The protests are over, I guess, because Reddit has, you know, killed our spirit and squashed us. But I wanted to let you all know about, you know, the Reddit mod team on rasswaf. And I don't know if any of you know, like, Chloe and I, I don't know, did you get your, I got my start in the fandom on Reddit. A lot of our friends did. That's where I first met some of our friends like Joe Magician, Brendan B Fish. I was a Twitter and Tumblr-er that came over to Reddit.

So I was a third generation Redditor, you know? Yeah. And then like, you know, from early on in our episodes, like Fat Walda, a bunch of other people have been on the podcast, loved that community. Like there's a lot of writing and a lot of smart analysis and great discussion that goes on there. And part of that is because, you know, a lot of people may try to make sure that it's a place that people can talk and like the moderation tries to keep it, you know, focus on that kind of like in-depth discussion. But Reddit, the website, just like Twitter, because literally Spez, the CEO slash founder of Reddit was like, you know who's doing a great job with their social media website? Elon Musk. According to who?

Elon Musk? Right. Oh my god. was like, oh, we're gonna, you know, start like fucking over third party apps, which is what a lot of us use to try and like keep it like a vibrant place of discussion and community. So anyway, a lot of moderators have been trying to protest against that. But unfortunately, you know, the corporate overlords won. But just wanted to share with you some of that news. And you can kind of check out more of that news i know that you guys have been posting it online well the reddit mods the old guard their watch has ended it was a really respectful watch

i was lucky enough to be bestowed several r a swap awards in my time you are an award winner i'm an award-winning r a swap contributor actually uh and i couldn't have done it without you know all the support from the mods keeping that place not a place to be an asshole like i mean really realistically i will say it was a place that you people could have opinions and not be assholes about it and i love twitter i love that there's a great a song of ice and fire community on twitter but twitter has turned into like this toxic cesspool of meanness it is very mean there you have to be very thick skinned on the internet these days you really do and like i know that sometimes things do get heated right within the subreddit but we try to we try to like keep it pretty clean i try to you know tell people you

know like we can disagree on these ideas like, just don't gotta be mean to each other about it. Mud slinging just gets everyone dirty. I used to like put that in my little comments. I think it is, it was a great place. And I mean, I got started reading theories on Tumblr and Reddit, right? I got started on Twitter. And when I was on Twitter with friends and learned about theories, you got linked to them at Reddit, you got linked to them to Tumblr, great communities that have been built. And I know Tumblr already had their slashing a while back with Yahoo, right? Yeah, they were the first 2018 17. Yeah. And I know that Tumblr never regained the same presence. I know a lot of people are still very

religious in using Tumblr and posting to Tumblr. And I so commend that I barely use mine anymore. I wish I did. I liked Tumblr. It was a fun format. But I feel Reddit kind of filled a lot of that void. It was it had a really good run. It won't really ever be the same. But it was always a resource. And it was always a place to, I mean, you could just search any theory or any character that you were interested in and read for hours from other people that love the books just like you yeah and i mean there's still like a lot of good discussion going on there i'm sure yeah it'll pick back up when wind is out but yeah there's some people keeping the fire alive like m toodles and like as as you said right we still link a lot of theories we cite so many theories from the subreddit still on our own podcast all the time i met emmett through it to an

extent too when with his ama this was my first intro to poor quentin oh i read that ama that's cute yeah it's kind of like end of an era in a way. I'll still like the Aeswaf reddit, but I will admit that I'm kind of biased because my wife retired. So now that her watch is ended, we're gonna live our good life. And thank god I already have the reddit memorized. Anything that's worth memorizing has already been in my brain, you know what I mean? Yeah. Like, it's been there from like now to 2015. I think of myself as an emeritusitus but I don't know if they do

but yeah thank you for letting me everyone talk about our early days I mean you know what anniversary what else would it be if you and I didn't reminisce a little this year

on the 12th anniversary of A Dance with Dragons. Thanks for listening to us for all these five wooden years, everyone. We're going to jump through our tweets and notes here and finish that out, get to our lightning round, and get going with Aria. First up, I have to say we got a great email from our very good friend warren i don't know you might have heard of him he's kind of a celebrity on this podcast it's been a while though we don't get to talk about him all the time but it's kind of a

celebrity yeah he is a celebrity uh and yeah we got to meet him this past April. Another A month. Yeah. Celebrity. He's a super Arya fan too. He's like the Arya fan. He's kind of famous for that, in my opinion. He's very like, go Arya, go Arya. I'm sure we'll talk about a lot of what he emailed us. It's a great email with some great themes about what to look out for in Arya's plot. Borin Arya's plot. I'm gonna wait for the eventual next email that we get from him because I think this is just one of many and I'm not trying to take them for granted. I really am excited about them. I don't want to go too hard with them yet. So Borin, thanks for sending us an email. You guys can send one in

if you want. It is girlsgoncanon c-a-n-o-n at gmail.com Send them in. Let us know what you're doing. If you have pet photos oh yeah please animal i'm gonna open i'm gonna expand this another like really active channel on our discord is our food channel if you have good recipes friends please send those over to love a recipe yeah we might send one back we eat so get ready we love food so send one in my gosh why not hot pies in these chapters you know oh well there you go

feast is back on the table baby it could happen it's back on the menu boy it's wrong series recently we got a review and i would like to bring this to the table eliana got her she got to preach for a minute about what she wanted to talk about and it's my podcast too so recently and i've cut this down but i have cut this down from what i originally wrote because i just think that this is going to be very clear cut but we recently got a review from someone who said that we should stop doing voices because it sounds like we're trying to make fun of the people that we're being. Gasp. So, I will consider it.

I will consider stopping doing the voices. And now I would like to do our lightning round. I'm still considering. As we consider, I'll come back to that in a bit just because this person's threatening our relationship. The voices are important to it. For the reason

she logs on every week. Kinda. This is one of those reasons too, right? The lightning round. Let's start with the very beginning of a Game of Thrones prologue. Ice zombies and more linger north of the wall.

Oh, we did that chapter. We did. We did the prologues. Bran won. Bran learns a valuable lesson about life and deserters from the wall. Catelyn won. Catelyn tells her husband that his father figure has died and the king moves north. Daenerys won. Oh, we haven't done this one. Across the Narrow Sea, Viserys hopes to wed his sister to a Dothraki Kal to regain

their lost kingdom. Eddard won. We started with this one. Yo! Let's go back. Back to the beginning. When the king proposes an alliance between a daughter of the north and the Crown Prince. John I.

Bastard. Motherless. Damned. Yes. I considered, by the way, and I chose against it. I'm going to keep doing the voices. You have to. If you don't, we have to get divorced.

The podcast is over. This is the only thing holding the whole podcast together. Chloe's voice acting. I think I have a career, you know? Yeah, there's actually a lot of more opportunities for this episode, everyone. So stay tuned while we renew our vows. Catelyn too. Catelyn's sister sends a message coded with family, duty, and honor. And Catelyn begs her husband to heed it.

That throws us right on in to Arya 1 in A Game of Thrones. You've heard of second sons, but here's why everything sucks when you're a second daughter. We don't know this feeling. I'm just guessing. We're just guessing this whole chapter. It opens with, Arya's stitches were crooked again. Her sisters, however, were perfect. Septimordain always praised her. But when asked about Arya, the hands of a blacksmith was mentioned. But today, Septimordain pays zero attention. It's Princess Myrcella that everyone is cooing over. This is a great coming of age kind of chapter. And it's almost kind of misleading when you think

about movies like where aria's going right you've seen movies like 80s movies like 16 candles or you've seen modern movies like ladybird or francis hot aria's different she's not like other girls she doesn't fit in with her sister she's's the odd one out. She doesn't look like her family. She loves them very much, but she doesn't fit into what she sees as what they want in their perfect world and their demands on her. And immediately we have her being separated from the other girls on that very first page. She's more like a blacksmith. She's not like other girls. blacksmith. She's not like other girls. Easily could have gone in a bad direction, right? Like we're at other writers, it could have gone really in a different direction. But George does a really great job of letting you understand like, it's actually okay, she's different. Like you read this chapter and you're like, she's just a kid. She's just a kid that feels spiteful and jealous and love and loves her family and has complex feelings. And she's just a fucking kid. She's not just, like, some other girl. Yeah, and I mean, I guess this is a trope and especially was during that time.

But, like, I don't think, as you said, right, it's bad. Like, she wants to be and she's, like, failing, falling short of, like, these sorts of expectations. And honestly, like, when I, i like i said earlier started the series when i started game of thrones the tv show that this chapter is based on oh my god and and the books right aria was my favorite character like one of my favorite characters and i have different favorite characters now i'm constantly i think i think they change a lot as we keep rereading this but also like you know though I've loved and have analyzed and written a lot about Sansa I think that like I think this

my partner also says like I'm a lot more like Arya oh yeah as a person and growing up I was I think much more like gender non-conforming as a child I was the one who was wild getting like dirty eating dirt eating sand and I was the one like as a child playing in like roughhousing with the boys and like um i understand what it means to be like at turns punished for being that way and then and at others you know some parents uh sometimes their parents found it charming the way that ned did but not always i think you I think my parents also didn't have the trauma of dead teenage sister in the war. Oh my god. Different trauma. But yeah, I really love Ari's character because I do see a lot of myself

in her character. Yeah, because you aren't like other girls to me. I better not be. Who are they should i fight them what anniversary everyone my god do i have it do you have what wood oh how much wood could have wood chuck okay the the blacksmith part though is also interesting uh that stood out to me this time especially when tied into that sword stuff and also her friendship with gendry yeah i was think that is i bolded it because i was thinking about it but i didn't care to write anything but i'm like maybe aliana has something because like the hands of a

blacksmith does that mean she might forge someday too that'd be really interesting i mean she she's really good at multi-classing it seems uh speaking in dungeons and dragons terms other dnd i know that the show has her have like a romantic uh relationship with gendry and i don't think like that's crazy to assume will happen in the books and i know that george at like a dinner in balticon 2016 i was not there but he confirmed more or less that gendry and aria would meet again yeah they gotta i mean come on the song the cute beautiful song the little autumn forest lass oh yeah i was like what song is there's like so many songs of ice and fire

it's kind of right i mean maybe i mean love is the theme right at the end of the day of music of life yeah of things i don't know that there's romance but i don't know that there's not you know exactly 12 years 12 years um we also i this stood out to me this time too, there's an irony of Septa Mordain, like, being so excited about having the privilege of instructing a royal princess. And I'm about, I'm like, girl, you've been instructing two royal princesses your whole life, turns out. Yeah, we talked a lot in Bran, I think, and in Jon, there were a lot more of these little ho-ho ironies. And especially in these first few chapters right going back and individually reading them in a row i'm seeing a lot of little things that are poking out to me like that and uh the the royal princes and princess comments are constantly in there

oh i just got it with nymeria also because nymeria was never a queen she was a princess and aria is a princess oh yep. Yep. Ugh. Just hit me. Sansa is chatting happily away. She is attended by the northern mean girl clique. And when I say mean girl, they're just girls. They're annoying. I got bullied by the girls too for being not like other girls.

I did too. I wanted to hang out with them, though. I was the opposite. I was more like Jane Poole, probably. Or no, like Beth Castle. I was just stupid and liked them. I was like, you're pretty, tell me things, give me your dolls. They didn't like me. I didn't fit in. I just played alone, man. I found a friend who also, she, her name was Chloe. Did you know that? I'm not your first? No. She and I had sex at recess and we would sword fight with them. You heard it here first, okay?

I have a type, their name's Chloe. Anyway, so Beth Castle, Jane Poole, they're all gossiping and Arya's like, what are you guys talking about? Include me. And they get very quiet and Sansa's like, the prince. quiet and sansa's like the prince sansa had of course sat with the prince at the feast and aria thinks that she was stuck with the younger fat prince naturally yeah okay but also like tom and rocks tom and rocks even in this book i get it though because like when you're eight you don't want to be paired up with the boy you want a a prince to look at you, too, for who you are. You know, like Brienne in a way, I'm sure we'll talk about her this episode. But Brienne is, you know, still wants love, even though she is a fighter and is a warrior.

That's a great point. And I mean, technically, that maybe does also, for Arya. There is a couple of princes. Not princess, but princes, plural. Ah, princes. That's true. She comes across a couple of them. And a couple lords, too. Arya's got an arsenal. She's got a little harem there. She needs to settle down. She's too young. No dating till I say so, Arya. Till I get a book. Then i'll decide if you can date yeah we'll talk based on what george says chapter especially in the winds of winter no dating

i don't like those boys she's running around with right now she doesn't either for what it's worth yes or no raft the sweetling there right it's not mary and tant it's like yeah okay season five yeah what is that crossing streams those those came first you know I can't even dignify what you just said with a response oh my god uh so you know bringing up Tommen though something I'm noticing and it's kind of funny maybe it's so loud to me on contrast in comparison and reading, but even in Arya 2 as well, Tommen and Myrcella, their personalities are really shy and sweet and calm. They don't overstep. They don't speak up or speak out too much, where Joffrey's just really annoying and really loud mouth and doesn't shut. Like even in, you know, this chapter, she's a loud mouth motherfucker. And Tom and Marcella are really well mannered and quiet.

Like, I don't know, maybe it really goes to show maybe ignoring two of your three kids is the way to go. I don't know. Maybe they turn out okay if you suck. But that said, they're really well mannered. Like they, even in the next chapter, they're a little haughty and a little like, know they're not nice to aria in the next chapter but why would they be they haven't been taught to be nice to people that aren't them i don't even remember them being that mean um but i guess we'll review it in the next chapter because i don't remember it but uh yeah i mean they're not they're just bratty they're also as marcella says they're children they're supposed to be bratty well there's a lot of that in this chapter, right? Yeah.

This chapter, especially the little northern girl clique, it's funny because what you and I just spoke of, of not really being in with the popular girls there, Sansa then experiences that in King's Landing, right? Until Margaery, like, adopts her in, but she's still an outsider,

so interesting for that flip for Sansa eventually that she's on the outsider so interesting for set flip for sansa eventually that she's on the outside with the high garden girls absolutely i mean i think that's the thing like their storylines are so intertwined sansa and arias they're not like pitted against each other in my opinion they have these like parallel storylines i mean they're learning that they're gonna understand each other one day, probably. So beautiful. I can't wait. That's one of the things that I want most, like,

for them to reunite. You know, you might say it's like a symphony or, like, an orchestra or maybe even a song. Oh, interesting. And maybe, like, two voices, right? Like, of ice and fire, but maybe both ice because they're storks. right like of ice and fire anyways so both ice because

they're storks a song of sun and moon oh there's a fanfic there's a fanfic i'm sure already of that uh jane whispers joffrey likes sansa and beth is like he's gonna marry her sans's gonna be queen and it's like yes but not the way we think keep reading george would say sansa blushes prettily and in fact she actually does everything prettily did you ever watch the brady bunch no this has been coming up a lot in my life i don't know why weird i don't think it's time i don't know i don't know if it holds up on rewatch now it's a classic though it is a classic but there's one of the characters has a sibling who is the older better funnier cuter everyone loves her sibling and when she gets mad about it she says marcia marcia marcia And that is a little bit of this chapter.

Arya's a little bit of a Jan. She's a Jan Brady. She is... It is interesting and it's kind of great. It's this younger sibling complex, right? Like she wants to be loved by her sibling, but she also doesn't want to be exactly like her sibling. But also, she kind of wants to go play

with her sister's makeup in a way and be like, what's this shit? What does it it do and she wants her sister to love her and also wants her sister to accept her for not always wanting to do those things and for the things she wants it's like a complicated i was around a lot of younger siblings one of my really best girlfriends growing up had like four younger siblings and it was kind of a crazy house i was always there like in the summers i her parents would um babysit me and i we would babysit the kids really is what would happen the whole summer and sometimes we would also do summer homework for fun so that was fun it was a fun household but do you should happens do you think that it's possible that George and all base their dynamic on the Brady Brunch?

Brady Bunch? Maybe. Not brunch, sorry. We do a Brady Brunch once a month on Discord. The Brady Bunch and all. Or, like, just that trope. Well, and, you know, he added Sansa to the family, as we've talked about, to add a little drama because things were too perfect because in a family with no sansa the boys get along with aria they say dad come on let her have a sword

come on with no sansa there is really no drama between them uh no expectation you know i mean look at daisy mormont how she was raised that it was okay. And it was actually, you know, it's a good thing for her to be a warrior. Maybe Ned could have embraced that. But with Sansa, Sansa so much wanted, and we've talked about this a long time ago in the Ned chapters and the Sansa chapters, but so much wanted, you know, she had those courtly love dynamics and aspects going on. Lyanna had those hearts in her eyes when she saw a crown prince. She loved musicians. She loved harps. She loved all the parts of chivalry.

The songs, the stories. And Sansa does too, and they make those great parts up of Liana, right? Of Arya as this little miniature warrior child, and Sansa with the moon in her eyes. I think that the brady bunch yeah could have had a little he could have thought just like the brady bunch jan and marcia they

fight all the time let's throw it together i really honestly maybe as a person who's not watched it yeah it sounds like i mean it was of its time yeah and i mean it was of its time he's of that time exactly so interesting interesting to consider thank you for listening to my brady bunch x a song of ice and fire analysis you know we are on our 193rd a song of ice and fire public episode with over like 50 in the tank on a swap on patreon and i gotta say you know you some days you hit gold some days you don't so take every analysis with what you get yeah i'm not sure what kind of metal yet the the brady bunch is but it's it's there it's one best analysis 2023 honestly so sansa tells beth not to make up stories as she strokes her hair and asks what Arya thinks of the prince Arya says well

Jon thinks that Joffrey looks like a girl and Sansa sighs and responds poor Jon he gets jealous because he's a bastard and Arya loudly responds uh he's our brother and Sansa corrects her saying half brother later on um with Septimordain watching them. And then Sansa also changes the subject saying that they were remarking on how nice it was to have the princess there. And I actually think that this is a pretty good cover up from Sansa. Septimordain is pretty unsupportive. I know our friends such as, I want to say it was Wendy, right? Like who wrote a pretty scathing review of septimordane and you know what i don't think wendy's wrong no bitch was not great and she also got drunk and slept

at her job uh yeah and then slots got harassed yeah it was pretty bad things are bad it gets overlooked and that does go to like some of those disparities right in gender that like it's just not as important to worry about what's going on there you know with the septa like they just didn't they're like good enough yeah keep them schooled next were they just the system's got it yeah were they like i don't know septas are hard to come by up here in the north we'll just do this for you catalan we fell even in king's landing yeah true the corruption goes deep bro it's failing it's a failing infrastructure i really think westeros is actually in their

late stage of capitalism i'm just kidding they're in feudalism are they though is feudalism really that different from capitalism in the end is the monarchy really that different from capitalism in the end wait sorry this is not democracy and the monarchy are just high-fiving over state lines so septimordane notices aria's lack of work unfortunately and is like let me see them stitches girl and aria is of course immediately angry and wants to scream and she's like it's just like sansa to attract the septa's attention hmm this really stood out to me on this read through that this is actually just a fantastic starting point for Arya's growth and arc because I'm gonna throw it out there not like blaming Arya but technically it wasn't Sansa that attracted the septa's attention but Arya she spoke just a wee bit too loudly while trying to kind of

extract secrets from the conversation to join the conversation and again don't take that wrong not trying to shift the blame on Arya but I think it stands out that she doesn't have control of her voice, like her volume in that way, right? And she's unable to weasel secrets out of people in a way that's like so different from the little girl that we see by dance. And even by the next book, right? Like Arya is learning to be way more mindful about what she discloses to people about herself, her own opinions. And by dance, her job, literally part of her training, is to seamlessly be able to join any conversation in order to get new intel. And she reports that back to the House of Black and White to show she's picking up those

skills and flying under the radar. And she's just come a long way from that child who's frustrated at her stitches. Absolutely. I actually have, I've been rereading Arya chapters, obviously. Really? This podcast that we do together. Why would you do that?

And I tend to read a couple of chapters at a time. I like to knock it all out at once and start, take some notes and cherry pick what I want to talk about, etc. But I've been I was reading Arya two and three. And I would even say that in these next two chapters, not just the next books, in two chapters, she kind of like King's Landing becomes her boot camp, right? When you get Cereal Ph cereal for involved. Yeah. And her first lessons with him are exhausting, right? And it's implied the way George writes it, that she goes day after day and she's exhausted and her arms are, you know, after four hours of fighting,

they're fricking jelly. Uh, and then chapter three is the chapter where she is sneaking out of King's landing, trying to get the cats, trying to get a Balearian. And she ends up in, uh, the, you know, down in the Balearian, the dread area, trying to get the cats, trying to get Balerion. And she ends up in the, you know, down in the Balerion, the dread area, the other Balerion, great connections that we'll talk about. And it's like she has to be silent and be invisible in the dark. And she also loses

her identity when it comes to Myrcella and Tom and don't recognize her because she looks all scruffy. And by the end of the book, when she escapes King's Landing with the Night's Watch, she's able to take off her face and put on this new face, quote-unquote, and off with her hair. But, I mean, even within two chapters, because Arya's chapter skips so much time, right? We don't

get an Arya chapter for quite a bit after this until after the Micah events, until Joffrey being an asshole. More of an asshole. Yeah, there's actually a surprisingly large amount of space between the Arya chapters in this book. I mean, we had a pretty long lightning round just now, you know? Yeah.

Yeah, she might not feel really a connection to King's Landing. We'll find out how she feels when she returns. But this was a training ground, I would say, right? Yeah, absolutely. find out how she feels when she returns but this was a training ground i would say right yeah absolutely and i her chapters also do a great job of i think world building as well you know some of it the other parts of king's landing while sansa's kind of covers a lot of the dynamics within the palace and the royal family yeah between catalan and aria we actually have a pretty good thing going catalan aria and daenerys cover a great amount of like the entire globe yeah no actually literally um and i mean even this chapter just gives us it gives us a lot of sense

of what the societal cultural expectations are for women. It's actually really smartly done by George because he's not doing it through someone who can live up to it, but he's showing us what the culture is through someone who's unable to reach it. Yes. That's so great. These are the unattainable little measures.

Interesting to think we really, I think we talked about doing it when we decided the order but i think we thought about doing aria and brienne for a minute just to highlight those but we didn't moved them yeah because now here we are remembering on our anniversary here so aria surrenders her work and of course septimordain berates it. Honestly. And everyone's looking at her. It's so mean. She's so mean. Yeah.

Sansa doesn't smile, but Jane is smirking. Even Myrcella looks sorry for her. Arya feels tears fill her eyes and she runs, Septimordain shouting after her. She manages a stiff bow to Myrcella and runs. She tells Septimordain she needs to go shoe a horse. And then we have this inner monologue from Arya. It is so sad, so heartbreaking. So being seven, eight years old, I almost remember it. It was a very long time ago, but I almost remember it. It was a really long time ago. Yeah. You know, like 75% of my life ago almost 20 years ago almost 20 years ago for me because i'm very

young you are you are again you're not melisandre's age fair maidens don't look at me don't look too closely at the ruby around my neck it wasn't fair sansa everything. Sansa was two years older. Maybe by the time Arya had been born, there had been nothing left. Often it felt that way. Sansa could sew and dance and sing. She wrote poetry. She knew how to dress. She played the high harp and the bells. Worse, she was beautiful. Sansa had gotten their mother's fine, high cheekbones and the thick auburn hair of the Tullys. Arya took after their lord father. Her hair was a lusterless brown, and her face was long and solemn. Jane used to call her Arya Horseface and neigh whenever she came near.

It hurt that the one thing Arya could do better than her sister was ride a horse. Well, that and manage a household. Sansa had never had much of a head for figures. If she did marry Prince Joff, Arya hoped for his sake he had a good steward. So again everyone, as only children, we don't really know what it's like to be compared to a sibling in this way which is why we're going off of the Brady brunch Brady bunch holy shit as our example but I imagine George does a great job of capturing the perspective

of a younger sister at a different life stage from her older sister and constantly living in her shadow and again I don't think it's particularly productive to compare aria to sanza i do think though it makes sense that readers do it because aria's storyline does it it opens with it um and again sanza resembles the standard that aria has been held to her whole life which she should aspire to as a lady and again really seamless great world building here from george and um aria you know she's she's kind of like sam right she's like bran after his fall like john like brienne like tyrian a lot of the characters that we get povs from they're unable

to meet that standard that westeros holds them to in terms of what they're supposed to be as like ideal you know man ideal woman ideal knight chivalric whatever yeah because people are individuals right they're not cookie cutters and you know Arya she envies Sansa Arya also admires Sansa I think people kind of forget that part right right? Like, she doesn't hate her sister. She just can't be her, because she's not supposed to. You're not supposed to be your siblings. And as Arya's story progresses, her life becomes not one of living in Sansa's shadow, but what's really interesting is how it becomes more embraced of living in the shadows in general. She learns to armor herself in her difference, as Tyrion tries to teach Jon in this very book, even though Tyrion's not very good at it. And this is also present in Sansa's storyline as she, you know, armors herself

in courtesy, right? And I think later in the books, we'll see that both the sisters' skill sets are really complementary as Arya learns to wield that life within the shadows. And maybe, who knows, maybe she's managing figures for Winterfell alongside her sister. I see them coming together and really collaborating towards the end of the series. That is my dream. If I wrote a second, which would only happen if Dance came out, not Dance, which would only happen if Wins came out, if I wrote a sequel to my son's essay, Dances with Wolves, it would be that her dancing partner is Arya. It makes perfect perfect sense as we'll discuss in the books later what i love you i just um appreciate you very much what did i do

and this is why they're dancing partners and scene gene cousin um no but it's really interesting what you've said about their skills and about kind of that slot they fall into in society and how they have to maneuver their way around that right like sansa learns that being a lady is a curse just like it is a blessing and a dream and something beautiful in some ways it's also a horror and a nightmare and aria learns that being aria stark of winterfell is maybe nice compared to you know the horror and nightmare that she's in so i think there's a lot of uh i think there's a lot of great echoes there and there's also something with the wolves right because up next she goes and she loves on Nymeria. And she thinks there's some great, because again, it, like you said, it reeks of a child.

Like, that's what it reeks of. This is a kid. This is a kid who just, like, loves their siblings. And I remember just being annoying. I'm still really annoying. But I remember being really annoying and doing stuff for no reason. And doing stuff for some reasons. And being emotional. I still get get emotional i'm fucking crazy but i was also still crazy back then even crazier

and it that's the thing you have to put that like shade on kids right so the wolf pup loved her even if no one else did i say that shit to my cat all the time, and I'm an adult. That's what dogs are for, you know? Yeah, pets rock. Unconditional love. Yeah. Monster wolves rock. Yeah, some cats. They go everywhere together,

and Nymeria had yellow eyes that gleamed like golden coins in the sun and had been named for the Queen of the Rhoyne, who led her people across the narrow sea and then she kind of thinks how sansa named her puppy lady and numeria licks her ear and she decides with numeria where they're going to go to avoid her mom and septimordane and i love there's something kind of interesting of that like binary and not binary of girls shouldn't have monster wolves right like that's not very ladylike so for aria it's a little different than for sansa sansa to get that okay in society she called her lady my dog is going to be the most dignified dog

out of the monster dogs that we own siblings likeiblings. Like, that is the approach that she took with it. She's like, because I am a lady. But Arya, and interestingly, and this might be like early gardening, right, for George. But the boys call Arya's wolf named after a witch queen. Bran says named after some witch queen. Nymeria's not really referred to as a witch. Yeah. Ever after that. So maybe it was gardening. Maybe it was like a kid misunderstanding a witch. Yeah. Ever after that. So maybe it was gardening.

Maybe it was like a kid misunderstanding a story. Maybe there's a story George never came back to. But interesting that, again, it's a witch queen because that's what they call most of the crazy women. Right. Danelle Lothsten, Shira, Dani, all the people that are like, we know, maybe not crazy. Maybe that's just like a different term for it. But she names her namaria and namaria was a disruptor man she was a disruptor out there she said burn those ships she said put

those men in golden fetters and send those motherfuckers to the wall she was different she was different she was kind of with a little gold fist down there uh she did things that women aren't supposed to do in society and aria was like fuck it we fucking ball we name her namaria you know she went all out because she's already out of the binary of society who the fuck's gonna judge her and so sansa does the right thing to do by naming her lady right or you know being ever so etiquette filled and ladylike over the name of my monster wolf and lady still gets killed right lady dies even though she was a part of that society and but that's the thing you can't like make a wolf a monster wolf a part of a society of that society that attitude well but you know not that society. Not with that attitude. Well, but you know, not that society.

Not the way that the Lannisters rule that fucking house. Yeah. That's not where we'll survive. They don't like dogs. I don't know what it means, right, for like Numerian Arya. I mean, it's interesting that that happens and then you have the parallel, of course, of Sansa trying

to stay in that society and then Ned and the plans going bye-bye womp womp womp like it's like just the ultimate horrible punishment and thankfully namaria gets away but what that means with aria and the end game and what kind of namarianess happens in the end of the plot is interesting i just thought the the roles of the lady dog should be considered yeah i mean wolf dog i like that you called out the witch queen stuff i kind of forgot that they called namaria that and it stuck out to me on this reread it's weird because i'm like she ain't a witch queen yeah and she she bucks the rules of society for like westeros right but what she did was absolutely

acceptable for the roinar um and and i, she saved a bunch of people. She saved a whole civilization in many ways, a whole culture, because she was like, we gotta run. We're gonna disappear from where we are, which is kind of what Arya does. In a way, yeah. As you were reading aloud the description of Nymeria's eyes the two eyes like golden coins set out because it's like oh coins

that plays a big role in Arya's storyline I was thinking about that on the ship the coin east hmm hmm and also she even bites into coins too later on in her storyline she's like

in feast yeah what are we she's like what are we doing here with this is it real is it fake she doesn't really know but she's gonna bite it anyway yeah and then jockin whose path she crosses uses it to kill pate well i think it means she's going to kill coin master little finger i'm just kidding no i'm just theorizing this is who's coin master oh my god the coin master what the fuck is she that would be his villain name his like fucking gotham villain name honestly little finger in and of itself is actually a gotham name let's be real when you were saying that maybe aria could like be her steward and saying that maybe aria could like be her steward and help her with figures i was like what you don't think little finger is gonna

stick around oh do you never mind no i'm just kidding i was just being sarcastic i was like i don't know maybe you thought that that would happen who knows i was like wow we're always keeping things exciting learning new things about each other It's like you don't even know me anymore. Oh, my God. Apparently not. Keeping it exciting. So Aria lands on going down to the yard to watch the boys practice. She wants to watch Rob beat the shit out of Joffrey's dumb face.

She and Numeria run there and they find John on the covered bridge watching from the window. He's like, why aren't you sewing? And she's like, I want to see the fighting duh so he lets her climb up in the window with him the younger boys are drilling bran and tommen and both of them are padded to the nines they look round and plump and they puff at one another with padded wooden swords while roderick watches them a dozen spectators watch and call out encouragement rob Rob is among them. Theon is beside him with a look of wry contempt on his face. I just love the image of Tommen and Bran all padded up and Tommen being round and

padded just because... We get that again in Clash 2, right? During the tourney when he gets up. He's got courage, he gets up to go face off against the straw knight again oh that's my little boy and uh and sansa then gets her own little chubby outfit in the veil they were cowards for not doing that when she's dressed up in like 80 layers that's right yeah she like talks about feeling like a chubby bear, I think. I'm like, that's me, for real. We need more scenes of them all padded up and soft. Arya and Jon bond like they usually do, because they're the only brunettes in the family, besides Ned.

And Arya used to wonder if she was a bastard too, but Jon had assured her that she was not. She asks why he isn't allowed in the yard, and he says that bastards can't hurt princes. Princes can only be hurt by true-bornborn swords and then Arya feels embarrassed for asking. So yeah yeah yeah joke joke joke. I see what they did there but also it's so funny how he's being so dramatic about it. Like it's like the thing you say to a kid. He's like oh you know bastards do- like obviously the real truth is because societally

it just looks bad to have the bastard down there because the queen has an issue with it because her husband cheats on her and has a lot of bastards right like there's also that that's kind of part of it that's true i didn't even consider there's another part of it i mean like societally it's looked down upon the other part being like ned's like stay out of the way because of my dead sister yes uh the snow ned snow sweating bullets no that was that was like before this chapter he's like sweating sweating sweating um but also it's funny because now that a song of ice and fire has unrolled and pre a song of ice and fire has unfurled in that time too right we know look at the great bastards look at people before them that were also bastards like obviously tons of princes have been injured by bastards look at the strong boys and amand right um there you go but

like obviously it's kind of funny that the lannisters fear that too right they like that is something they wouldn't want their prince to be hit by a bastard that's kind of makes you look bad too makes them look bad oh a bastard got your prince oh yeah you know it's scornful it's we're bad us lot but it's also just really cute because he's being dramatic to Arya and there's something about these chapters that's so like laden in innocence in these moments of not quite understanding things because of her maturity like the jokes and the actual reasons

fly right over her head crazy compared to Harrenhal even when she's at Harrenhal she's like making lewd jokes now she's like been ruined she's been fucking ruined by time and society but she just knows that society's named shit to be bad she just doesn't

get why and now she gets to learn why over the next couple books and that that's like you said that childhood thing right you don't know why the things are bad you're just told that they're bad and yeah sometimes they're not really bad right like that's that's part of what uh really works with aria's storyline and the Jon's and she doesn't just accept the rules on face value no pun intended faceless value yeah right

but yeah that's funny what you said of yeah Jon's probably being kept out of the yard too cause Ned's like no one can see they're gonna know they're gonna know. They're gonna know. They're gonna find out. They're gonna find- I mean, they're gonna find out.

And, yeah. No one's gonna know. That's part of, as you said, the joke, right? As many have pointed out, the irony of bastards can't hurt princes, because turns out Jon is the prince. Joffrey's a bastard. It's also weird that Jon's like, oh, I don't know, Joffrey's so pretty, he looks like a girl.

I'm like, doesn't everyone fucking say that about Jon, too? Mm-hmm. That's so pretty he looks like a girl i'm like doesn't everyone fucking say that about john too that's so true bestie that's another reason it would have looked bad they would have been like whoa look at that guy he's like way prettier and like way better which is kind of i guess how john thinks of jamie too in terms of kinship his lips aren't even described as worms you know what i mean yeah so sexy what what what other animal do we pick if not worms i actually don't know maybe how would i know they're a villain what is he gonna do not give them iphones maybe lips just aren't supposed to look like any other animal um i also want to say i kind of feel bad for john but i am also appreciative of him like reassuring aria in the past when she's like oh no john because we look alike am i a bastard too because obviously he's

trying to tell her like oh no you're not you're not a bastard like me which is makes you really sad because everyone thinks it's a super bad thing and he has to comfort her while still being like exiled by everyone I'm just like poor babes

yeah it's kind of a bummer because it's like again kids don't get it but yeah big sad he's a sweet boy to be able to put it aside you know he gets that they're just his sisters well his cousins well anyways actually yeah cousins god aria is like i should be down there i can fight as good as bran and john's like you're too skinny you can't even lift a long sword and he messes up her hair and he's like did you see the prince did you see the prince uh she sees him by the high stone wall surrounded by lannister and baratheon men and knights and he nods at the arms on his surcoat, ornate embroidery, the stag and the lion.

Jon says the Lannisters are proud, the royal sigil isn't enough for them, and Arya protests and says the woman is important too. Jon chuckled. Perhaps you should do the same thing, little sister. Wed Tully to stock in your arms. A wolf with a fish in its mouth? That would look silly. Besides, if a girl can't fight, why should she have a coat of arms?

Girls get the arms, but not the swords. Bastards get the swords, but not the arms. I did not make the rules, little sister. I miss them. I know. It's so sad. When are they gonna come back? It's been 12 years. Wait, no, it's been 14. 17. I don't want to count it. No, I think it's

been more than 17, right? I don't. 96. That's when this came out. Oh my god, we're going on 30 years with no john and aria together anyways i love that george kept the the sword building in his world he kept it in mind when making dark sister right and when coming up with like Dark Sister being skinny and being for somebody with a smaller, more petite build to be able to handle. And I think it's such great world building because you even get that with like Lion's Tooth slash paw slash whatever. It's proportion for Joffrey. It's smaller.

And then, of course, when Jon gets Longclaw, it's a bastard sword. Yes. Right. So a bastard sword longer than a long sword or a great sword meant to be wielded with two hands uh and not meant to be easy like they're literally made to not be easy so of course like his walk in life yep yep good call outs good call outs we have another one here too right but the wolf with a fish in its mouth i don't know if that's like intended by george or if that's gardening, but Nymeria, the

wolf fishing out Catelyn's body, the fish, the Tully. You called out the Arya protesting that the woman is important too, and I want to remind everyone, I will never forgive D&D for having Arya say other girls are stupid instead of, you know,

how Arya actually is, which is the woman is important to. D&D did the wrong kind of I'm not like other girls. Whereas George has Arya. The good kind. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry. And so stupid.

Shout out. Not a cast just did a great episode. I think it'll be on their Patreon. It might even be public. It's on season three of Thrones. I think it'll be on their Patreon. It might even be public. It's on Season 3 of Thrones. And they brought up that other horrible moment of Osha and Meera's

fake fighting and how silly it was. And that they just did not want girl bosses with their swords to have fun. They really didn't. They just could not fathom the idea that women might actually get along or girls might get along. It's really...

Motherfuckers. Show them our podcast. Look at us. We get along or girls might get along it's really motherfuckers show them our podcast look at us we get along so great sometimes yeah but we're also complex we argue too i think we discuss we debate i don't say we argue we can argue about that uh there's also something interesting there too i think with her telling um telling john that the woman is important too in regards to joffrey's parentage i'm reading too much into this but i thought it was kind of interesting uh because joffrey right royal bastard as we know uh turns out the woman is important too, especially in Jon's storyline, meeting his mother in her own arms, because turns out he actually gets a Stark from his mother's side, because his father is a Targaryen. I love that, because then Cersei was like, the woman's important too, and then she fucks her brother and makes bastards, yeah!

Yeah, she's like, only the women are important. Take that! Fuck. bastards yeah she's like only the women are important so something else about bastardy that i think is kind of funny here oh oh it's funny to you sorry not that kind of funny interesting funny haha no not funny haha more like funny not haha um so aria fears being a bastard right at the start of i don't know her life uh same same as how kind of like in her storyline changes right sansa's storyline actually ends up she seems a little disdainful or is like mindful of those distinctions with Bastardy, but ends up becoming one as a Lain Stone in Feast and presumably wins. And Arya's storyline, though, kind of seems, I would say, to follow the same path to Bastardy but differently in regards to her she also gets the sword but loses the arms as she becomes a faceless

person yeah that shutting of identity the secret interesting because there's secret princesses stashed around the world and secret tunnel secret tunnel makes me think of when Agen

and Viserys were separated Aegon and viserys uh were separated aegon three and viserys oh those were separated yes like which aegon and viserys is she talking we've talked about that as rikan and bran right before but it's also sansa and aria in a way too with one overseas and yeah interesting they're complimentary there's also that bit like with Catalin and we'll get into a little more of that throughout Aria's plot but her relationship with Catalin and how it may have straightened it right after seeing Jon

treated the way he was and also F her not embracing the more ladylike courtesies and court behaviors you know you get that great line way later on of when she thinks about to see her family again, except she doesn't. When she's about to see

sorry, god! When she's about to see them and she thinks will my mom even want me? Like, would she even take me back? Sorry, I really didn't mean to make it this sad. We're so close to the end of the episode. It's okay, we just started the Aria storyline, but it's okay. We can be sad now. It's fine. Yeah, it's fine.

Even though this seems to be not a sad episode. It's fine. Yeah, so anyway, so her mom that dies, just like the rest of her family, and all of her trauma, as I was saying. But yeah, like, you see the way that Catelyn treated Jon,

and as we've talked about, was wrong that's what makes her a great character because we support women's wrongs and rights on this podcast and Jon but not Septimordain not Septimordain fuck that bitch but Arya's straight up you know she does worry

like her mom won't want her because she isn't what her mom showed that she wanted in a child, in a female presenting child. Like, that's a- it's hard. It's a hard society, and we see some of that, like, the losing of the identity and

everything, and feeling disconnect from your family since they've all been slaughtered anyways, and what is there to lose, and where do you go when you're hunted? I hope that she can like find some way back to her family and some sort of closure for her mother and her

I know that we're almost to the end but it's like spurred a thought of the way, because we don't see Sansa and Arya interact with Catelyn in the books we do in the television show. That is one good thing that D&D gave us, seeing Sansa and Catelyn interact. But we don't in the books. And in a way, Catelyn's specter, you know, a guy who's still hung up on her mom trying to kind of mold her into Catelyn to Electric Boogaloo, right? That's a great point, yes.

She's being forced to live in her mother's shoes, whereas Arya can't do that and is wondering, will she be accepted by her mother? You know, they're both kind of still chasing chasing her they're both chasing after that shadow of what they're supposed to be yeah and I'm sure Sansa's finding as she gets older probably like I'm not my mom

yeah I'm really not please leave me alone little finger yeah out below I'm really not. Please leave me alone. Little finger. Yeah. Out below in the yard, a shout rings out, and Tommen rolls in the dust, Bran standing over him. The men all laugh. Roderick calls out for them to stop. He's like, well fought, well fought. And he says, Rob, Joffrey, go another round.

Theon is too cool for school, unfortunately, and and he's like this is a game for fucking kids and joffrey is like rob may be a child but i'm a prince who grows tired of swatting with play swords i like this continuity of joffrey's character that we get in this in the next book right he's trying so hard to seem like a man grown when i mean he is a child right and they should be doing childish shit as marcella reminds him yeah well and it gives you some insight to to crowned princes before right like targaryen princes at what age they were supposed to be training for what things and you know you think of how rob in this as we talk about here in a moment you know they they go back and forth but Rob doesn't really practice with a real sword. He's never had to. He's

not supposed to be prepared for war or to be attacked. That's true. I do think the Stark kids are a little stunted in some of their education in that because there's no need for them to do more. Yeah. I mean, they thought it was a peace time. That's what they fucking fought for. That's what Ned fought for.

And, you know, it's a good thing for Rob that he was a peace time. That's what they fucking fought for. That's what Ned fought for. And, uh, you know, it's a good thing for Rob that he was a prodigy until, you know, shit hit the fan. And there's no need for him to have learned. That's the other thing, I mean. Ideally, there's never any need for your children to learn. Yeah.

I guess Joffrey kind of chased that because of his father's war, quote-unquote father's war stories stories too. I don't know, it's like the industrial Westerosi marriage complex and the industrial war complex and they thrive off one another, so. Yeah, I feel like Joffrey, I don't know, I feel like Robert would be a hard father to live up to. Yeah, I could see that in the way that Joffrey behaves. Yeah, and in the way that his dad beats him but you know whatever fuck um yeah joffrey and rob bicker back and forth and john watches telling

aria joffrey's a little shit also true joffrey wants to fight with live steel roger's like we don't need that you're gonna do blunted tour swords. That's as far as it's going. Sandor steps forward. He's here. And he's like, who are you to tell the prince not to have an edge on his sword? And Roderick's like, I'm training knights. They'll have steel when they're ready. The burned man looked at Rob.

How old are you, boy? 14. I killed a man at twelve. You can be sure it was not with a blunt sword. Arya could see Rob bristle. His pride was wounded. Sandor is powerful, yeah. Dude, he's picking on kids, Chloe.

He's making fun of a fourteen-year-old. Leave me alone, I'm having a hard life. He's being an edgelord edgelord sandra cluckane i do i this is actually really fun in aria's story though and for it to be in her chapter because it sets the stage i think for their relationship considering like i mean yeah it's meant to be a little bit of his like very edgelord shockery that the hound has like killed a man when he was 12 uh well you know newsflash ari is gonna one-up him by the end of this book she kills someone by age nine or at age nine our own little you know she's so precocious uh and just like just like him it's not with a blunt sword it's with a pointy non-blunted sword

yeah also like it's not a cool thing is it? I think Sandor and Arya both learned this in their time that's true it's taken Sandor a little longer but also that's just the excuse he uses

in order to live his horrible life every day it's like berry of westeros you know oh my god sandor is the berry of west kind of is actually we'll have to think about that actually he literally kind of is so much just made sense to me in those later aria chapters in this book interesting um so wait wait hold on. Random fact. He's 27, right? Sandor here? If you add Joffrey and Robb's ages, they are 27. That means absolutely nothing. yeah i could see where george wanted to link sandor and aria together possibly like where he was like oh that could be fun here uh especially showing him showcasing him in this moment in her plot interesting i can't wait for those chapters with the brotherhood i'm really excited for those

you know it's gonna be good yeah not a cast did a really awesome job on it i have to say they had so much fun doing them and i know they love the brotherhood so i will be uh inspired by them i'm sure yeah we can split up our chapters if we want four parts baby yeah uh rob begs to use a real sword but roderick says you can do it with a tourney blade which is true like you should be able to that's like a metaphor if you're good you should be able to fuck him up with that. Joffrey shrugs and says, come see me when you're older, if you're not too old. The Lannister men all laugh, and Theon seizes Robb's arm to keep him away. Joffrey gathers his brother and leaves, I can imagine that in my head, gathering the pillowed boy.

The scene ends with everyone red-faced and semi-fighting one another, and Jon watches them all leave. He grows still, scratches Ghost behind the ears, and tells his sister to run along to her room and deal with Septimordain's wrath. Boo, boo. There's a bit of funny language there where it says something like,

Theon holds Rob in his iron grip, and I was like, oh, that's funny, because he's ironborn, but also I'm like, that is kind of what he does throughout the story for a little bit too. So trivia. Some of this is meant to be foreshadowing for Once Upon a Time when George was pitching this book. And a lot of things have obviously changed since this. He wrote what was called the 1993 letter is what we all call it now because it was written in 1993.

And some of this is meant to kind of set up the tension between Rob and Joffrey because they were actually supposed to meet in the battlefield and show that, you know, Rob was, I think, going to actually best Joffrey there and cut off his hand, a la Jaime's storyline. his hand a la Jamie's storyline and then I think though Rob was eventually going to die I suppose in battle like betrayed or something somehow as opposed to what we got which was like way more shocking and we relived that episode recently with our friends on a thousand eyes a thousand eyes in one podcast there's a couple of other shades you can still see of the 1993 letter here which we talk about every time we revisit a game of throne chapters right like i think some of the john and aria relationship weird as it is to think about like there's a moment where she like blushes or something or is embarrassed around john and i'm like is this supposed to be about like the 93 letter where they were supposed to develop romantic feelings for each other oh god that that was a that was supposed to be a thing

it was very you know Shinji and Rei I was gonna say that's so Agen Rainey's and Visenya of him I was thinking you know dead mom shit you know cause she looks reminiscent of his dead mom but that too that is Electra's shit

well well well or Oedipal actually not Electra that's true in this circumstance for once yeah but uh this is a feminist perspective no I'm just kidding um yeah it's uh I'm glad that he's maybe steering away from that yeah I don't know though once you find out your cousins I mean you know I mean you have your first, and then you have your second cousins. He swerved from that, I think, to be instead of Arya. He's like, what if we did different incest and it was his aunt?

Yeah, I think it's better incest at the end of the day. Yeah, I think so. I think it's a little more removed. I think cousin's, like, less weird than aunt, but that's just me. I guess. I don't know. I don't know that this is a productive i'm not related to anyone let's move on of course we have a very classic passage between aria and john to close it out the longer you hide the stunoner the penance. You'll be sewing all through winter. When the spring thaw comes, they'll find your body with a needle still locked tight between your frozen fingers.

I hate needlework. It's not fair. Nothing is fair. He messed up her hair again and walked away from her, ghost moving silently beside him. Nymeria started to follow too, then stopped and came back when she saw Arya was not coming. Oh, that's foreshadowing. Reluctantly, she turned in the other direction.

It was worse than Jon had thought. It wasn't Septa Mordain waiting in her room. It was Septa Mordain and her mother. Her mother. Busted. Very beastie boys right is it yeah yeah like fight for your right to party yeah yeah yeah that's true you know busted uh well you know you got both ari and sans right? Learning that life isn't fair through the death of their father. Happens later in this book.

Both learn that they gotta play life by a different set of rules than they thought. I think Arya comes to the lesson of it a little bit differently, right? She's already felt that things were unfair earlier on in her life, in her inability to conform. And interestingly, like, partially because she is a child, right? Like, she has a very still black and white view of what justice should be. She wants life to be fair in that childish way and kind of ends up learning vengeance as a proxy for justice. And I know that George just mentioned, and obviously we'll get into this later, that he took inspiration from child soldiers

And obviously we'll get into this later, that he took inspiration from child soldiers in writing Arya's character. Yeah, that is what she kind of becomes, right? As we go along, she loses a lot of that humanity. I think there's a lot of that in the books. Like, I mean, Sandor, obviously, right? That's a big part of his plot. Jaime losing his humanity. Catelyn literally losing and unloosing her humanity. Jon being deaded.

Probably refinding it, you know, because, yeah, part of Sandor and Jaime's storylines. Yeah, Beric. I mean, there's a lot of that. There's a lot of that. And it's interesting. I'm kind of looking at the needle quote. So obviously this is a big talked about foreshadowing piece by fans. It is foreshadowing.

George actually back in 2001 had an exchange with a fan and he was like, you're on your own when it comes to foreshadowing. And I'm like, aha. So it is foreshadowing, George. on your own when it comes to foreshadowing and i'm like aha so it is foreshadowing george uh back in the day when i was very young and a lot of people i think when they were very young in their analysis of song of ice and fire and their thoughts on it would think you know oh something bad is going to happen to aria oh no how dare i am no longer in that one dimension. I am on the fifth dimension. I am way above all you fools. I am playing another game of Thrones.

No, I'm just kidding. I think it's more inclusive of her whole story, right? The longer you hide, the sterner your penance. It's almost a riddle. That's her whole story. She's hiding from who she actually is. Arya Stark, she's now the girl with many names, with no names, with no face. Losing yourself and losing that humanity that you speak of through vengeance or some sort of placebo to get some sort of justice in this world.

The longer you go without that humanity, the harder it is to come back. And we're seeing that quite literally when it comes to characters like the Fire Whites, like Lady Stoneheart, like Beric, who knows how it will be for Jon when he comes back. And she's not dead yet. Right? Arya Stark is not dead yet. She's not too far gone. And I think the line is more so foreshadowing her probably painful. I'm not sure the journey will go very easily for her, but her journey back to W Westeros eventually I think that's more over what that line is foreshadowing for her yeah I agree I think that's a spot on analysis of exactly like I think what we're gonna see with her storyline and we can see she's never truly given up

that Stark identity right that's why she hides Needle and I'm gonna put it out there I don't think Arya is gonna die i disagree with that uh with that interpretation of this quote i actually thought and i'm sure other people have thought about this and said it but you know if they find her body that's just just like the body right like i mean obviously it could be fucking anyone they do find a body that is allegedly aria stark's right so i got yeah

frozen fingers but a frozen nose jane pool who yeah i was gonna say they find a couple bodies when you think about it exactly that could be aria stark exactly and i think that's part of it too right it's harder to come back uh when someone else is out there pretending to be you it's like excuse you you? Excuse? Yeah. Stole your username. How could they? How could they? Yeah, I think there's something really solid that could happen with Arya's arc. George could do something so funny.

Like write it? And he could release this book. Two different kinds of people in the world. Me, release it you write it I think they're both just different roads that lead to the same castle what you and I said I really would agree Aliana

and there's nobody that I would rather be forked across the road with than you on this journey so thank you for recording with me this evening for Aria 1 it's been a pleasure it's been a wonderful time, Aliana. I actually did have a really fun time. I had a fun time with you.

As referenced by the first 12 minutes of the podcast. No, it was like 23 minutes, Chloe. It was like 87 minutes. It was like, and we kept going, even into the lightning round. So as we said, we have a little something special as we get to the end of this episode, but we do want to remind y'all where you can find us on social media

you can find us on twitter still at twitter.com slash girls gone canon that's c-a-n-o-n but keep your eyes peeled not yet ready but here's some foreshadowing we are working on getting a girls gone canon blue sky

because Chloe and I have made that migration claimed our own faces over there yeah we are over at blue sky you can find us under if you are a twitterer if you're a tweeter and you are becoming a skeeter that is what the posts are called yes and i did want to say it for you all today it's just so honk honk um if you want to skeet skeet all over the timeline and you get one of them accounts, it is, I think, the same usernames as the old Twitters. Yeah. So Lies in Arbor for me. Arithmetric.

Arithmetric. Arithmetric. Am I supposed to put these in our show notes now? Maybe we'll link them. I don't know. I'm enjoying it. It's quieter. It's definitely quieter, but it's like old school twitter vibes absolutely it reminds me of the

good old days and people are getting lots of invites lots of faces are showing up so i'm having fun on blue sky i'm blue sky and all the time it's not exactly like the old twitter days and that i have like more characters and i'm not like on my like flip phone texting yeah i'm at this cool show right now to like what four two four two four or something so it'll go tweet but yeah i'm old uh i'm caitlin starkage i get it i get it my friend thank you uh anyway well that said thanks for listening this week. As a reminder, as we said up top, if you have thoughts, you can always send us an email at girlsgonecanon at gmail.com. But I think these people are going to remind you about that in a sec.

Yeah, absolutely. Like we said, here's a word from our friends. From our sponsors. From our sponsors. You can catch Girls Gone Canon on any of the following streamers on podbean itunes google play stitcher heycast spotify overcast apple podcast iheart radio audible and amazon podcasts you can also join us on patreon where if you join the Thunder tier above you have access to a Discord and monthly happy hours and things like that. And by joining the Discord you get access to a bunch of great channels including but not limited to memes and shit posting channel, fashion hour, there are

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I have been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I have been another one of your hosts, Eliana. We'll be back with Aria 2 next week. Bye one of your hosts, Eliana. We'll be back with Arya 2 next week. Bye! I don't know about y'all, but I'm 2.