Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 231 — AFFC Cersei III

Episode Date: October 18, 2024

There's a wedding (again) where no one dies except Cersei's patience. Ghosts of weddings haunt her (and the reader). Bonus: Listen to a developing, ongoing B plot where the "B" stands for baseball. --- 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: liesandarborgold.com Intro by Anton Langhage

Hello and welcome to Girls Gone. Canon Reads A Song of Ice and Fire, Episode 231. Circe 3 in A Feast for Crows. I'm one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts, Eliana. Today we are at a wedding once again. Actually, this chapter fucks, and I have to give you the context

that I accidentally outlined Cersei IV before I outlined Cersei III. I don't know how that happened, but I am very tired. And that said, I was very much more ready for Cersei 4 today, but then after rereading Cersei 3, I'm here to report it also fucks. So good news. She's gonna be even more ready next chapter. And if I forget to take out a reference to next chapter and her calling it then

Circe 3 in the previous episode just so you know This is what happened, but I might remember we'll find out. Is this a good reminder for you? I hope this is a good reminder for you. This is a reminder. We're so excited to be back with Cirsei before we jump into some emails of note as well as the Lightning round which is classic today. No worries, keeping it classic. And the episode of course, Housekeeping. Last month we put out a Patreon episode. We do this every month actually so it's not that crazy of a thing that I'm announcing. Every month we put out a bonus episode

and this is for patrons at patreon.com slash girls gone canon. It is for stranger tier and up patrons. Sometimes those patrons sponsor us to put it out for you guys. That could happen for you this year Stay tuned you might hear a sneak preview convince you to join up last month We put out folding in Dorn asterisk the asterisk is it may or may not have a title change someday This episode is the first in Potentially a trilogy and you know what they say about trilogies folks It becomes two trilogies and then it becomes three trilogies. Look under your chair.

And then we never finish it. But we will, I think we're gonna finish this one depending on, you know, if we get more material. How many trilogies? It could go on. It could go on, which would be fantastic. I would love that. If we get Blood and Fire, you will probably get three trilogies on this. The book we want. If we get Blood and Fire, you will probably get three trilogies on this, so get ready. Folding and Dorn, covering the first and second Dornish War, part one that was released last month, and then this month her patrons were covering Stranger Tearing Up, Sand Kings,

Novelette by George R.R. Martin. Haven't read it yet, and I'm going to on a plane tomorrow going to the big ol old state of Texas. Yeehaw! And I'm sorry Texans if you hear this it wasn't at you it was more like for me. I'm gonna read it on the plane I'm really excited about that. So that's October it gets a little creepy a little scary real George RR Martin or George BB Martin depending on what episode you've recently listened to. Energy! We'll find out about Novembers. I'm feeling a little excited.

It could be any. It could be any. We'll see. Yeah, I'm pretty excited. And, I mean, there's still a couple of things we gotta get to at some point. For example, we'll make a brief reference to this soon, like the final movies for Sailor Moon finally released internationally. Mm, yeah, that's true. Magical Girls Gone Cannon. Final movies for Sailor Moon finally released internationally

Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's true magical girls gone cannon. Yeah, we can bring that back. I Okay, you would think that because I was so excited. I would have watched already, but I'm like, I'm just not no I'm saving it. I know I'm saving it. I'm not ready for it to be over again You know girl me. I'm gonna see you this month. Oh yeah. We could watch an episode or two on a device if you bring like an iPad and we download it on Netflix. I don't know. Maybe. But we could literally watch this.

Stay tuned to this space, everyone. Stay tuned to this space. I have to bring my laptop anyway because I'll be working throughout that time and they gotta bring it back home with me at some point. Well speaking of us seeing one another, you can also see us every month on our Patreon brunch slash happy hour, which if you're listening to this, October's has already happened. For some reason we're scheduling them earlier in the month. It's like we have our fucking lives together, it's insane.

This upcoming one is going to be on November 9th at 2pm Eastern, and not only do you get access to those fun video calls, you also get access to the rest of our Discord, which has channels full of fun times. You all have been talking about interesting things over in Food is Good lately. I think I'm gonna start sharing, you guys, I inherited a sourdough starter on my birthday and it's not dead. I left it and forgot about it in the fridge for a month and a half. And you know what?

It fucking lives. We are so good. I'm about to go down this hole. I know a lot of you went down it in the pandemic, but you know what? It fucking lives. We are so good. I'm about to go down this hole. I know a lot of you went down it in the pandemic, but you know what, whatever. I have a starter that lives in Michigan. Oh really? Yeah. The spirit comes to you when it comes to you.

You know? Oh, I've named mine Sauron. Get it? Sourdough starter. So you can learn about your own sourdough starter on our Discord. You know, Eliana might start giving out the info because if you don't have your own yet, then you don't have a family member or friend that's forced it on you. Yeah, I mean, I don't know how to actually start one from scratch. I don't know how to like conceive of one. Oh, it's kind of like scientific.

You like, it's like you take a little bit of that and add it to the new one. Oh, yeah, that's what I did. I don't know how to like, you know, if you have nothing, right? If you're just using fucking air and flower and hoping that it'll just, you know, capture spirits to make it happen. No, no, no.

Like I don't know how to do all that. They make the internet for that, so. Yeah, the rest of the internet will help you, not me. Discord brunch, November 9th, 2pm ET. See you there, Thunder Tier and above. Alright, we've been getting a lot of positive emails about Cersei. The Cersei census is good. Things are good in our fandom here in the GGC world Everybody loves Cersei new show this fall. Oh my god Actually, thanks to our friend

Sailor Brandon, Sailor B, Brandon for writing in we had a great email from you and We did get an email from our friend Alex. Alex joined us back. Oh my god Rewind the clock. Yep, Catalan finale. The last catasude. The red wedding. Yeah. What? What? Actually there's some red wedding I think kind of callbacks in a way. Like there's a there's it's in the background of this chapter. Yeah. Only fitting we read some of Alex's email and paraphrase some of it. It's beautiful and long In another wedding of sorts well spotted well struck Eliana your grace I'm so clever

You were so Alex fucking emailed us and said the promised day has arrived at last Alex fucking emailed us and said, The promised day has arrived at last. The Circe hive has waited for more than half, wow, wow, of our GGC lives for our hour in the sun and it's here at last. Right, like first Rowan, now Alex, you two are ridiculous. Everyone brought the drama for this POV and their emails. They told us this was melodrama.

Alex is excited that we're at Circe, and they wanted to take a beat to talk about some of our other coverage that they're reminded of here, like John Connington, where the experience of the TV show that the books has altered your perception or just informs what you first think of when it comes to certain characters, and Tyrion is another one of those, right? And the absence of John Cunnington in the show makes them think of this. But Cersei is polarizing, Alex says, in-universe, in-fandom. They live rent-free in five other POVs, or no, I said that wrong. Cersei lives rent-free in about a fifth of our POV's minds, and she's been so present

because everyone's obsessed with her. Inserting the Mariah Carey gif, by the way. The collection characters have the most chapters in the book, like Sansa Cat, Arya, Ned, Tyrion, Jaime. I feel like when we get into Cersei's mind, we're already arriving with our own baggage from other POVs and misogyny. Tyrion and Littlefinger say she's not smart. Clearly these logical men, who never let emotions or prejudice influence their decisions, are

the best objective judges of a sister they want to fuck or a woman's character. Tywin and… you know… I kinda wanna say it anyways, Tywin and Draco in leather pants in fandom wubi on a redemption arc Jamie, and dear dead uncle war crimes Kevin, Rip Bozo, say Cersei is unfit to rule or lead. And they're not wrong, but they're largely viewed right because society says any woman who doesn't stay in her place, dares to have their own mind, soul, heart, is bad, unnatural, wrong, and generally a non-starter. Cersei has ambition and talent and smarts, and as well as beauty.

Shout out little woman. Woman. Am I right? We first see Cersei so much from biased eyes, and we still see Cersei could do her job well when she wants to, and as a person of employment, big mood. Small moments, but in Tyrion 3 ASOS, Tyrion speaks about how Cersei is capable of such ruthlessness, how she's capable of such charm, and flirting with Lord Tyrell and complimenting Lord Redwine, right? The girl Cersei once could have been, and you could almost forget about her vengeance and

ruthlessness. She performs her duties the way she land the Clevers the Iron Throne out from underneath certified lover boy pedophile and domestic abuser Robert. Quote, unquote, bold, underlined. Certified lover boy. Cersei had honorable Ned Stark over a barrel, got him to agree to her terms. By the end of Agot she won, asterisk, won the Iron Throne. But she's undone by Littlefinger, the same Littlefinger that undid Ned.

But Ned's not stupid or unfit for his role, for being deceived by Littlefinger, but Cersei is. I'm not claiming she's amazing as a player. I'm not saying she's a bad one. We gather she's self-taught, student of observation, and by the end of Agathe, Cersei is in a pretty good position. I can't wait for her roaring rampage of revenge. She's Westeros!

Image politics, backstabbing, conniving, while smiling prettily and showing the world your virtues, beauty, nobility, wealth, while you bleed from the inside because you're rotten and broken. Cersei is not only mother, she's the queen Westeros deserves. Hallelujah! Cersei is not only mother, she's the queen Westeros deserves. Hallelujah. I agree. And I guess I'll close this out for Alex. Catse forever.

JK, I don't ship. Unless. Anyway, can't wait to stalk your inbox like the Valon car, this POV, XOXO, Alex, a messy bitch who lives for drama. Which, pretty sure Rohan also signed their email with XOXO, Rohan, a messy bitch who lives for drama. Did they sure Rowan also signed their email with xoxoRowanRassyBitch who lives for drama. Did they write these together? Drunk together?

I don't know. Hmm. Maybe. Not like maybe in the universe, perhaps. Thank you very much, Alex. I love there's this is a laden with pop culture references. Just like us for real. Sorry.

They're everything to me. They're not like us, which is referenced in this email. Um, that took me out. Sorry. But also I guess it's reference to the other stuff. But anyways, uh, yeah, I don't, I mean, what is there to say? I, other than like, I think that a lot of what Alex shared here is something that I took into going into this

chapter and really thinking about CERC in comparison to especially some of those other Lannisters and that perception. I also do want to give a shout out now that I remember from Brandon's, Sailor B's, sorry, email of, you know, we perceive C Circe so differently from other POVs, like, you know, Alex was talking about Ned, and a sailor bee brought up the scene where Ned's like, I know the truth that Jon Arryn died for, and Circe replies, do you? And you see, Circe is like this ruthless, having person, but honestly, she's just like, oh, for real? Do you? Like, you know, because I fucking don't. I don't

know why that man died. But all these things get projected onto her, so. S. It's even calculating when you put it that way, right? Like, she's saying, do you? Because she doesn't want to give away that she doesn't know. Like, she is playing. She is playing an eight-dimensional game here. And I think we're gonna really get into some of that today. I love this chapter. I mean, Tyrion's a little afraid of her in some ways too, for real. Fucking should be. Yeah, he's like, I'm gonna mess up my cousin's life just to get a hold on her.

Poor Lancel. Well, let's go into this lightning round. We'll start off with Jamie 1. Jamie handles his grief as well as he can. Cersei begs him for the handjob, but still he refuses. It had been a while I thought you'd like that. He says no to the handjob. Brienne 2.

After some more Ares Targaryen background, which could mean nothing or could mean something, Brienne taunts the sigil of another Hedge Knight. Honestly don't know. No one knows, because we need a book. Sansa 1. Sansa is haunted by Marillion and Robert Arryn in the Halls of the Eerie. All hours of the day. Fuck your life. Oh my god. The Kraken's daughter, Asha gathers her followers in pursuit of the sea stone chair, the salt throne, the only chair that matters. Yeah, I don't know, like, seriously, just give up on the iron throne. Who cares about that? You should go after these fucking other- these other chairs out there.

Well, just like Season 7 and 8 told me, Cersei and Euron- just kidding. Oh my gosh. Welcome to Cersei 3 in a feast for crows, where Cersei attends a wedding, where all of her neuroses are pounded into her skull over and over again and all she can do is get absolutely shitfaced to deal with it. Oh, I pray the Seven will not let it rain upon the King's wedding, Jossel and Swift said as she laced up the Queen's gown.

No one wants rain,' said Cersei. For herself, she wanted sleet and ice, howling winds, thunder, to shake the very stones of the Red Keep. She wanted a storm to match her rage. To Jocelyn, she said, "'Tighter! Cinch it tighter, you simpering little fool. Something very funny in Jocelyn, like, first of all, I hear Jocelyn from Bob's Burgers. Jocelyn, every time I think about her. Also, there's some sort of irony here of Jocelyn

having said in the last chapter, oh, rain, it's good fortune, and the rainbows come out, you know, and that's, you know, good for your grandfather's death. But here it's like, no, rain is bad. I hope it doesn't rain. She like, you know Jocelyn is astrology girly is all I'm saying. She's like out there, portents, signs.

And there is something there of like rain being auspicious to the Westerlands when you think about it being like, you know, like the Reigns of Castamere. Like in Westerland, Reign is probably a very auspicious thing. And Jocelyn's an interesting character, her in Dorcus especially and Senel, but Jocelyn specifically being from House Swift and being like a named character from a house, right? We don't really know much about her as far as her age necessarily, but she's almost portrayed as younger.

And she has a pretty big role, like she's the one that covers Cersei up after her walk. There's just an interesting place with them and them being so active in Cersei's life and so around her even though they don't get their own stories that I'd be interested to see, except they're no longer her maids, right? Because... the Faith gives her maids now. But... Yeah. That's a great call. I kinda forgot about the big role that Jocelyn plays, so I'm gonna keep an eye out for that as we continue this story. I mean...

As she flits between the pages. Yeah, as she flits between the pages. Yeah, as she flits between chapters three and four. I like also what you're saying about rain. Like, for, I, there are some cultures where rain on your wedding day is in fact, considered, as you said, auspicious. I don't know about when Westeros, I don't know if like, you know, Alanis Morissette singing in the background or who knows what, but the rain is here again and so I'm like, oh yes, Lannister things, but today is in a way, it's not a Lannister day, right? It's a Baratheon day. And she's thinking about the desire for storms, which I do think is interesting in the context of the Baratheon specifically. This is supposed to be Tommen Baratheon, as we're reminded later on. And then you're like, oh wait, but he's not, but they're like, come on, Cersei, at least fucking pretend he's

a Baratheon. But I mean, Cersei was, right? Like, the Baratheons are supposed to be hard to kill, and Cersei fucking does it. She's the storm that does them in. She does in Robert. And Robert's a sore subject, and he does kind of haunt these pages of this chapter, which I like. His cloak will come to everything. This wedding really enrages her. Everything else happening in Westeros does too, but especially this, right? Because of that ghost. And it turns out that Tommen's hold on the throne is weak. Who knew? It's weakened by Stannis, by Riverrun, by the Ironmen. Yeah, you talking about how everything is enraging her, not just one thing reminds me again of how you've referenced often Selina Meyer already.

Staggering. Staggering. Well, there's this line that I like of, so long as Ironmen prowled the sea like wolves as to why the throne's weak, and I'm just like, oh, that's so funny. The iron men like wolves, that's so Theon-coded. He's not prowling right now, though. He's having a really bad time. Yeah, seriously. Interesting, considering like Asha chapter coming right before this, right? I think there's a lot of parallel in there we'll talk about today,

but especially with the idea of like the iron men maybe taking the North, and in the next chapter for Cersei, Cersei IV, there's some talk about making an alliance with them potentially, you know? Never know. You never know. Yeah, and I mean who knows what might even happen between like the Iron Men and Stannis or some of them, right? Because as we know, Asha is with him right now, also having a bad time. Maybe a worse time. Circe can't get rid of the roses, so Jocelyn Swift must be her verbal whipping girl in the meantime. And I think you can see here a lot of parallels with Tyrion in a way, but in general, like how those of power see other people beneath who are beneath them as replaceable outlets for their rage. But Tyrion kind of takes it out on I mean, for example,

like he takes out his frustration with the situation on on that serving girl and rapes her. So I don't know, or it's implied that he does. Yes, that is true. It's different. It's different than this situation. But there are other situations that parallel that, to be fair. I mean that's just how they were raised, the Lannisters. And of course something you're going to touch on today and we're going to come back to is like, again, Jocelyn feels a little younger than Cersei, maybe I'm making that up, she could be older, but she feels younger looking back on some of these paragraphs that she shows up in, and it's also reminiscent of Sansa, right?

Now that Sansa is gone, she has no whipping girl to sit there in the corner and listen to her, and as she gets wine drunk and she talks about what a failure her life has fucking become, so now Jocelyn gets that rage. Interesting to think about because we're only a few chapters into the book, we're really not that far in, and Storm and Feast are pretty near close in timeline. Exactly. The Queen sends for breakfast two eggs, a loaf of bread, a pot of honey, and the

first egg has a bloody half-formed chicken side and she has to now take it all away and bring spice wine. Listen. Listen. Okay, I'm experienced with this. Like, it wouldn't really be bloody or not that bloody probably, like, this is just balut. Alright, put some salt on it and eat it. Like, usually it's duck, and not chicken, but like, this is not a big deal. When you put it this way, for real. Yeah, I'm like, this is just Filipino street food. Jamie arrives, furthering her bad mood, explaining his process in keeping the king safe from being poisoned, which is pretty meticulous. Tommen will be safe, I promise you.

Safe? The word tasted bitter on her tongue. Jaime did not understand. No one understood. Only Malara had been in the tent to hear the old hag's croaking threats, and Malara was long dead. Tyrion will not kill the same way twice. He is too cunning for that. He could be under the floor even now, listening to every word we say and making plans to open Tommen's throat. Suppose he was, said Jaime. Whatever plans he makes, he will still be small and stunted. Tommen will be surrounded by the finest knights in Westeros. The Kingsguard will protect him."

So what's interesting about this scene is like all her life, and we're really seeing that come through, Cersei has just been seeking safety and security and turns out being at the top of the pyramid doesn't make you more safe, but it increases your enemies, right? And that comes back later this chapter, she realizes, you know, she says it basically to crown them is to kill them, that's sort of Damocles shit. And also, like, as Dani's story points out, in regards to the loneliness of gods, but there's also, I think, that undercurrent of the inherent lack of safety and power that comes from her being born a woman and that constant feeling

threatened, right? Like the of at any time, am I am I vulnerable at all times? Yeah, and it's so evident in the panic and clamor and all of her decisions in the next few chapters, everything she says in the next few chapters that's going to come back to her. Also, I didn't realize this until you read it aloud, and we don't know, because we don't have a sixth book, how Cersei will react to Kevin dying, but she goes Tyrion will not kill the same way twice, and I'm like…

And then he does. But he doesn't. Which we talked about. It's a verys. Yeah, framing it. So like, what if Cersei does fucking see through it? That'd be… that'd be interesting. Yeah, isn't it crazy that this whole time it's been like what if Cersei does fucking see through it? That'd be interesting. Yeah, isn't it crazy that this whole time it's been like the answer was Varys?

That's who's in your walls Cersei, and that is who's killing from your walls. Yeah, but like I mean because he tries to make it look like the death of T- so like what if she realizes? I don't know. I never thought about that. Well, no one will believe her because no one will be there that cares about her. That's true. Well, no one will believe her because no one will be there that cares about her. That's true. Unfortunately. She... oh, she fucking Jon Snowed and Ned Starked it.

Wow. She's all alone. You never want to be all alone at court, sirs. Oh fuck, I'm so sad. Well, oh wait, well, I guess she didn't send away Kevin. Kevin just got killed anyways and so did myself. They were just murdered. She glances where Jamie's hand once was and reminds him that the Kingsguard had also guarded

Joffrey. She commands him to guard Tommen all night, not a random guardsman. Jamie must guard Tommen inside his chamber." Again a choice being made out of panic and out of fear and not necessarily irrational because that would be maybe wrong to say. I don't think irrational, but there is an interesting like chain of logic that you don't want your lowly like people to do it, I get that,

because Tommen is close to you and you love him, but also you should be able to trust the Kingsguard, the finest knights in the entire realm, and you're asking your manager, Jaime, to do a lowly job. It's like just not effective or streamlined, right? Especially with how short they are on bodies right now in the Kingsguard, like they're all working literal skeleton crews. Some of them look like skeletons, you know, they're all skeleton crew.

It's like when people come and ask me to do things that aren't my job at work because they trust no one else and they're afraid of trusting anyone else, that's what she's doing right here. I'm like, you have to follow the chain of command, Cersei, you literally are like part of it. I don't care that you're a C-suite employee, a Cersei-suite employee. Well I guess it's not that weird to have the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard doing it, but he is notorious for not keeping kings alive. But it is his kid, but granted one of the other ones was his kid too. Anyways. He failed a few times is all I'm saying.

He failed a couple times. Not great at his job. It literally goes against the spirit of what his job's supposed to be, but it made sense. It did make sense. Diversify the shift schedule, it's all I'm saying. Oh my god. Labor rights. So furthermore, Cersei doesn't want Margaery alone with Tommen, nor the cousins. The Queen of Thorns was like,

The husband and wife should sleep together, even if they only sleep. It would bring them closer. They could sing and play games like Margaery and her cousins do." And Cersei's like, they can do that shit in the maiden vault, but they're not gonna do it in my very manly manly boy, Tommen's room. He's the king. And Cersei's like, I'm sure her grace knows best, and surely we can agree they should spend their wedding night together. Now, Cersei is pushing Jaime to keep his eyes on them in the room to ensure there's no danger of

consummation through giant orgy. I'm like, what is this, Viserys the second? Oh my god. With his wife, his old wife. I mean, that is kind of. Kind of? Yeah, anyways. We'll come back to that. I mean, that is kind of. Like, kinda? Yeah, anyways. We'll come back to that. Jamie thinks this is ridiculous because Tommen's a baby, and Cersei's like, well, Osifer Plum! And starts, like, ragging on him about Os for Plum without context, which he doesn't really remember.

We have this line here of, He is near as ignorant as Robert, all his wits were in his sword hand. Forget Plum, just remember what I told you, swear to me me that you will stay by Tom's side until the sun comes up." For those of you that don't remember, Ossifer Plum married Elena Targaryen and died, it's said, during the bedding ceremony because that pussy that good. No, I'm just kidding. Am I? Ask her husbands.

But his dick was so powerful she got knocked up immediately. They say, quote-unquote, there's overlap that rumors it could have been Egan IV, or could have been someone else, who knows. A Targaryen girl who's getting pregnant by someone we don't know and it's not the person she married? That seems unlikely. Wow, no one's ever had sex out of wedlock. Especially not Cersei. I actually do love that Cersei remembers who Ossifer Plum is though. I was like, okay, get it. And like, on one hand, she's been reversed in the histories that I think a lot of people give her credit for. Like, how many other

people? Like, how many of all of you know about the Ossifer plum stuff? So, and also like, again, comparing her to Tyrion, like, the plum thing comes back in his chapters and in regards to like, the questionable parentage thing regarding Targaryen lineage specifically, you know, with some of the people he's interacting with. But also I think, is this like a special interest subject for her? Questionable parentage that she's just like retained? Questionable heritage of historical figures for obvious reasons? Like, is this her special interest?

It makes you wonder if she also read the heritage book. I kinda think she did. I think she paid attention in her studies. I'm starting to really think that. I think so too. And the blonder and older they grew, the more she was like, fuck. What else was there to fucking do? They don't got TV, they don't got phones.

She sure didn't introduce another gene pool to those kids, I mean, my god. Yeah, I mean, she was like, huh, interesting idea. Targaryens? There's pregnancy books and then there's books about incest. And she's like, inspo, putting that on my Pinterest board. What to expect when you're incesting. Oh my god. I actually do find the structuring of the plum story really really good and well done that

George like garden this and then has brownbent plum and dance and then you have of course the mystery night written around the same time with Maynard plum as blood ra, so you're getting those secret identity kind of ideas out there, or people with blood, with dragon blood that are in hiding out there, and I just think it's like such a very clever subtle way to keep introducing this theme through them. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

And I mean, I do think something big is gonna happen with Brown Ben Plum. I don't know what yet, but he's important. It'd be funny if he, like, tried to take a dragon and then it ate him. I think he could, like, mildly succeed, maybe? Who knows? Like, the dragons do like him. We'll find out someday, won't we? Maybe sooner than later, or maybe later than sooner.

We'll figure it out. Well, we have this other line from Jamie of As You Command, he said, as if her fears were groundless. Ugh, terrible feeling to have. Terrible feeling to have. She feels dismissed. She's like, I thought we were in this together. No wonder she's fucking lashing out.

Yeah! He asks if she still means to burn the Tower of the Hand and she says yes, after the feast. Jaime tells her, be for fucking real right now, if Tyrion was in that tower, we would have found him. I love this strong symbolism of not just her burning out Tyrion and smoking him out, but it's also her like changing her story, erasing this tower that she grew up in Right that she ran around the walls and halls of this is where she grew up. This is where she read those books this is where she she learned courtly intrigue a lot of the time in her formative years and By erasing this canvas with wildfire and this land

She's able to erase Ned Stark able to erase and this land, she's able to erase Ned Stark, able to erase Tywin Lannister, able to erase every single one of these men that have held her back. And we see that use of the tower metaphorically asserting that direction of the female POVs and feast with Aryen or Sansa and the Eerie or Asha visiting a Lannis,

but here is Cersei burning the tower of our female-led POVs, and I find that so fascinating and strong in this chapter. Especially we talked about the tower in Bran's chapter, right? Often as like a tarot card, as symbolic, and I really love this description of the tower card in tarot. Say that like 10 times fast. I love this description of the tower card in the tarot. Say that like ten times fast. I love this description of the

tower card in the tarot that comes from Tina Gong, a tarot illustrator and author, and she says, the tower card depicts a high spire nestled on top of its mountain. A lightning bolt strikes the tower which sets it ablaze. Flames are bursting in the windows. People are jumping out of the windows as an act of desperation. They perhaps signal the same figures you would see chained in the devil card. They want to escape the turmoil and destruction from within. The tower is a symbol for the ambition that is constructed on faulty premises. The destruction of the tower must happen in order to clear out the old ways and welcome something new.

Its revelations can come in a flash of truth or inspiration. And this is what Cersei is aiming to do, right? For the things she cannot control, she lashes out. And here she's lashing out and burning down this tower that was constructed on faulty premises to create her own way, whatever that is. But is it something new, is the question, right, that we're all asking? Or is it a regurgitated version of what she learned from those before? That's an interesting question. And yeah, I love that this feels exactly like what's going on in this chapter,

especially like not just the constructed on faulty premises, but the ambition Ambition as Alex called out earlier and also how she admires like she brings up I think ambition again in Taina. So Yes, meeting yes, I will say Jamie's like, I don't know Tyrion's not in the tower I know because I freed him. I know he's not there. I, no. No, he's not there. I said goodbye. No. He's not there, Cersei. Don't ask how I know. I gave him a little air tag on his way out. Air tag? Stop. So they had found many passageways below, some so small that boys had to explore them,

and there's a passage to the Black Cell, a stone well that had no bottom. Interesting. Fun. Chambers of skulls and bones, sacks of tarnished silver coins from Viserys the First reign. Sorry, the well just spoke to me. I love wells in video games that you get to go down for no reason. down for no reason. I like, love that idea of the well, that's so great, it's spooky, it's creepy, it's scary. Ooh. Skulls and bones.

Tarnished silver coins from Viserys the First's reign. That's why I think the Gardener coin could be from the dance, by the way. I don't know, I just feel like there's a lot of artifacts from that time that's just littered around this fucking place. This castle is like hoarders fucking paradise. It's just full of shit. Oh, cuz dragons and they hoard, uh, cute. Ha! But also, I don't know. I-I-I don't know. I like- I'm not- I'm not sure that it's from that time. Like, I do think that there's a little bit,

especially now that they're talking about the passageways being so small that they have to like send children through, feels very much like foreshadowing for Barry's little bird's confirmation. And then that ties this chapter together with Kevin's. Hmm. Mm-hmm. But I can see what you're saying also with the thousand rats thing that comes up in a right now. Yeah, I think George was playing, you know?

He was like, ah, I don't know, I just also think it's a lot funnier if it's just a coin that was chilling there for like a bajillion years. But there is no Tyrion, there's no Varies, and Jaime had called off the search after a while and after a bunch of boys like fell down the shaft and broke their legs. What the fuck. We got stuck and the guards vanishing through some of the side tunnels. We have a line of, some of the other guards swore they could hear them calling faintly through the stone, but when Jamie's men tore down the wall they found only earth and rubble on the far

side. This really stood out to me. How creepy is this? This is so like, it's interesting because we read a lot of Harrenhal and a lot of the lore is like fabled about Harrenhal and like everyone's like, oh, it could be haunted. Things have happened there and like creepy things have been said to happen there. But this is like a real time version, like less fabled. Like we're seeing the creepiness happen.

Not a fable description, an actual occurrence, an actual happening. And I started to kind of pick apart Cersei's chapters in more of a horror sense now that we're starting to get in, especially with that panicked, paranoid way that we open the first chapter, something akin to like Rosemary's baby in some aspects, right? And that's on respecting. And this is something that in my adult world I've learned a lot more of compared to when I was like a 20-something bopper. I mean, I am 20. A teeny bopper, you know, whatever.

When I was younger, horror movies aren't just scary movies, right? Like horror has an especially wide scope for what qualifies as horror and there are a lot of elements in her chapters like Sir Robert Strong, Qyburn, Necromancy, right? Magical danger fire that we're seeing in this chapter, disappearing passages, rats in the wall, body dysmorphia and dysphoria, like simultaneously, girl has both. Murder, scheming, psychological horror, suspense, paranoia, it all fits the build. The bloody chick. The bloody chick. Is that not... It's delicious. Okay. Wrong person to say that to.

And wrong person, and I have a podcast with you so that's problematic. But Cersei is like our protagonist in a horror movie. And wrong person and I have a podcast with you so that's problematic but Cersei's like our protagonist in a horror movie when we're in her POV and she's not going to realize that the true villain, right, this whole time she's chasing a villain and the true villain mayhaps Jaime, if you will, he'll be upon her when it's too late, his golden hand descending on her. Like it's kind of insane, you know, you're never killed by what you think is the killer, then boom, twist, and that was the killer. I don't know, it's definitely horror. There's a lot of horror in these chapters. Yeah, I appreciate you explaining all that because I notoriously do not watch very much horror, so I don't know. notoriously do not watch very much horror, so I don't know.

But I mean, it's everything that you're saying, right? Like there is a lot of like weird creepy things going on in in King's Landing and it kind of frames Circe ironically as a witch even though she's not like she's very not pro witches as we see throughout her storyline. She tries to burn witches and women down all, like... Yeah. There's, um... I mean, she's like the... she's the evil queen, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Mirror, mirror in the wall. And there's even another, like, repulsion. It's a Polanski film from 65, but it's a classic horror film because you have a character suffering from the pathological fear of interaction with men, which that's so valid and so real. She goes on like a holiday, they leave the flat, go on an Italian holiday with her sister and roommate, and she withdraws into her apartment and starts getting these hallucinations and

she starts thinking things are going to come out of the wall and kill her and her fear gradually like mutates into madness and I do think that there's some of that going on. I wouldn't be surprised, yeah, if that was a little bit of the inspiration and yeah, could be Jamie's golden hand. It probably is, but I still think it would be really funny if it were Tyrion. I mean like funny in the, she was right the whole time.. No it would be hysterical. Yeah. I'm into that. Cersei plans to smoke Tyrion out if he's in the castle and she tells Jaime that she means to build a new place beyond the river after the war. She had dreamed of it and we have this line here of a magnificent white castle surrounded by

woods and gardens, long leagues from the stinks and noise of King's Landing. This city is a cesspit. For half a groat, I would move the court to Lannisport and rule the realm from Casterly Rock. And just like for reference for all of you, this is one of those moments that people like to point to when they suggest that Cersei and Jaime may actually be Aerys's children, just

just so you all know. And for the record, in my opinion, my views do not represent that of the podcast. In my opinion, if any of the Lannister children are Targaryens, I think it is Tyrion. I however am a Tyrion Targaryen agnostic. There's enough evidence there that I'm like, I don't know it could be true It might not be if you want to hear me talk about this more you can go listen There's a history of Westeros episode where I talked about this a bit. So just you can just listen to that there Yeah, I lean Tyrion for sure on that but I also lean will never know for sure We might never know. I think if he does it

I think he'll hint at it a couple times, and I think it might be there, but we'll never know, and then like, but you know still. Which is my favorite kind of knowing, honestly. Yeah, I just don't think it's Cersei and Jaime, if any of them are. No, no. And to lend a little context, Ares, of course course in the world of Ice and Fire is said that he wanted in 265 AC to build a white city entirely of marble on the south bank of the Blackwater Rush. Now, this comes to us though in a passage that I find really fucking fascinating and

each sentence talks about a year in history and what Ares Targaryen did. So after his coronation, he announced his intent to conquer the Stepstones and make them a part of his realm for all time. In 264 AC, a visit to King's Landing by Lord Rickard Stark of Winterfell awakened his interest in the North, and he hatched a plan to build a new wall, a hundred leagues north of the existing one, and claim all the lands in between.

In 265 AC, we get offended by the stink of King's Landing, he spoke of building a white city entirely of marble on the south bank of the Blackwater Rush. In 267 AC, after disputing with the Iron Bank regarding certain monies borrowed by his father, he announced he would build the largest wharf fleet in the history of the world to bring the Titan to his knees. In 270, during a visit to Sunspear, he told the Princess of Dorne he would make the Dornish deserts bloom by digging a great underground canal beneath

the mountains to bring water down from the Rainwood. Interesting. You see what I'm laying out here, Aliana? Some of this is a little bit reminiscent of Aegon's dream of a Song of Ice and Fire. Yeah, it actually is like, wow. When you lay it out. Yeah. I mean, the dreams don't only speak to good people, unfortunately.

Yeah, and that's akin to what Cersei is imagining here, that she dreamed, and she says she had dreamed of it. She dreamt of a gleaming white castle ruling and you know, there's there's a lot of theorizing for you Lord of the Rings nerds out there. There's a lot of theorizing that Cersei could last and be like the Sauron character and like you have to go back and defeat her. Exactly, your Sauron bred starter. And we've talked a little bit about how Qyburn in her arc makes her a player in this magical ground. So this also to me speaks of a little

bit of magic in her arc. And interestingly enough, we're sitting near the same book where Jamie's going to go have his magical Weirwood dreams, right? So interesting to think on. And in a way, that whole concept that Aerys had of all of these things happening reminds me a lot of the Golden Path in Dune, right? The broad vision of the future that only the Kwizots Haderach and the Bene Gesserit could see, where you can see the way through the many causes and strifes and effects that affect humanity and like there's one tiny path and it requires all these things to happen. And right there I do wonder like was her eye opened

by Maggie in a way? It was blood magic. It was blood magic and now it haunts her dreams. Could she have visions? I mean I don't think it's out of the question after rereading this. Either either blood magic or like, I don't know, maybe she interacted with like something weird wood-esque at some point, right? Like, there's a couple of things. Especially where they were, yeah. Yeah, especially because like that's how Jamie gets his dreams. So like, wouldn't be surprising. It does feel like a thing. It also makes me think of... I don't know. One day I want to ask George, George, what do you think about Gabriel Garcia Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude, which is about a family... I'm about to fucking

just spoil this whole book... about a family that tries to like, found the city, right, that is seen in a dream by a patriarch of the family called Makondo, and throughout the entire thing you keep getting the recurrence, it's about like, the cyclical nature of things, you get recurrence of so many characters who have all the exact same name from different generations, but also at the same time, a lot of them are alive at the same time, so it gets confusing, and there's the constant threat of incest, and it ends with an aunt and her nephew not realizing they are aunt and nephew. And banging. Anyways. Sometimes I wonder. But. Interesting. Interesting.

That's it. That's it. Yeah, I don't know. Like, I'm not opposed to the idea of Circe having some sort of prophetic dreams. I'm into it. Yeah. I mean, Maggie took her blood. You never know. What if, like, something about the research that Grant grants that she's been giving Qyburn, like, plays a big role somehow in the fight against, like, other zombies, you know? Mmhm. It probably will, to be fair, because he's ex-BFFs with Marwen. Interesting.

Yeah. Food for thought, food for thought. That was me blowing my load in this episode, by the way. That was the big one, guys. Really? Oh, I think you were. I mean, I really was cooking. Thank you. I think I was cooking though. I was cooking something up there. Yeah some food for thought.

Look at you you're chewing on that. Think about that tonight bitch. I'm also just hungry. Okay well. Jamie says that moving Tommen to another place would be foolish, more foolish than her current folly, burning the hands tower. The realm sees Tommen as the true king on the throne, and if you hide him under the rock, he is just another claimant." And Circe snaps, she knows that, she was just thinking about it, which mood. But I mean, both of them are kind of right. But what I find mostly interesting about this is you end up seeing a consistency with Circe's character, because these desires here of wanting to whisk Tommen away from danger kind of line up with the way that she had them pull Joffrey out of the Battle of

the Blackwater, even though he needed to be out there in order to give that sort of show strength, inspire people, let them see like their king fighting alongside them. And you know, kind of like Catlin, she's wrestling with how do I manage the safety of my children by letting them lead and perform power? And I think it's a much more difficult balance for her with Tommen than it was for Cat. I mean, I think Joffrey was just a difficult balance in general. But anyways, Rob was older, he was raised to rule and he's older than even Joffrey was whereas Tommen is eight years old.

And honestly, you can only go so far in displaying power with an eight year old, like and she knows that, everyone fucking knows that, we all know that, and like I don't think she's wrong for being worried about Tommen staying with his wife. I don't think like anything is going to happen to him there, most likely, but I do understand like at its base level when you strip away all the fantasy trappings of it, like it's just like any parent being worried about their kid going to a sleepover. Like, of course you're a little worried. What's going to happen to my kid in the sleepover as a person who's not a parent to anything but a sourdough starter.

And then the frustration of, you know, just being able to want to voice want, just wanting to like vent and you know, it might be unrealistic, but sometimes you just wanting to like vent and you know it might be unrealistic but sometimes you just gotta like vent and there's that dynamics of like doing that versus you know someone taking what you're saying as a very serious desire and I'm gonna be real like I'm usually the Jamie in this situation and like a lot of my friends and it's very frustrating for them. Oh but you have made it in other ways. I'm just putting that out there.

You have a lot of you have a lot to give still don't think yourself short I I'm just like I'm very solutions oriented unfortunately Well, but I also think like there's a certain I think you'll probably speak about this a little bit today, too But there's like a certain gap right in mm-hmm the. I think about it a lot with as we get older and as like people that are a decade before me. I never understood how people that were older than me could be so fucking nonchalantly like,

you'll get it someday, you don't know anything. True. Like I know everything, what the fuck are you talking about? But then as you get to be in that same generation, those problems from another generation, you look at them and you're like, your problems are nothing and you are silly. Go get back on your Zoomer apps or whatever. And it's so easy to do that. And I'm not looking at this generationally necessarily, but Jamie has had so many other

traumas in this time and that he's grown so far apart from her that like they cannot possibly comprehend who they are anymore. Like you do not know the person standing in front of you anymore. You have become too fucking different over the years and there's nothing really there besides your incest children, which is what she's desperately trying to fucking grasp onto, right? Like she's literally grasping onto grasp onto, right? Like, she's literally grasping onto them with whatever she can, whatever claws she has left, because her entire world has been just uprooted. Yeah. Yeah, I absolutely everything to what you said. I

actually thought this note here for Gap meant you were going to talk about the five-year gap and how Tommen would have been older, so it would have been less... Oh. The risks would have been a little different, but I- no, absolutely to everything- That's smart too. That's what I thought you meant, my bad, but- No. Yeah, I totally feel what you're saying, because sometimes it's not even like, you know, I'm like, this problem's- it's like, you're gonna get it. I believe in you, younger person, you're gonna fucking get it. You're gonna look back and be like, wow, I figured it out. Things like that. And like, perspective. The way that you

grow in general, like, changes who you are. And Jamie and Circe, when you're in a relationship for a long time, and if you're not intentional about it, like, you might find yourself growing into other people. And that's not bad. That's not wrong. You just grow into people who don't necessarily make sense together anymore, or like, you can also grow together. You can be people who support one another's growth as well. And like, there's just like all kinds of connections you're gonna make in your life.

And that doesn't mean, it's just hard for them. And I think they do a really good job of showing Jamie and Circe's relationship as a breakup of people who have been together for a really long time, growing out of it. I mean, this is like the only person he's ever slept with. And what's crazy is he was finally allowed out of the castle, right? Like he was finally allowed out. Sure he got kidnapped a little bit.

He was kind of prisoner of warning for a little. Just a little, just some kidnapping. Lost a hand. But after he went kidnapped a little bit. He was kind of prison rewarding it for a little. Just some kidnapping. Lost a hand. But after he went out on this adventure. Yeah. It's not treason if you come on her tummy. What? We haven't said that in a while. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, you're right. That's what Lancel says. That's a deep cut. Yeah. It is.

It isn't treason if you come on her tummy. But but You know, Jamie has gotten to leave and Cersei has been fucking trapped in this place That is the only place she really knows anymore and people are trying to tear her from this place You look at last chapter with Kevin, right? Like he's trying to tear her from that from the only place she's known in the past However long like decades right like you think one to two decades She's lived here and Jamie gets to leave and gets to have this experience where he becomes, you know, this on a humanization arc or redemption arc or whatever the fuck you want to fucking call it. He did lose his hand though.

He did, but he gets to leave and go do all this stuff and he comes back a changed person and he's a different person. He's not the same person and she is the same, maybe a little worse in a good way but the same yeah absolutely and we absolutely get that here in this exchange every plane something helicopter I don't fucking know oh our game just started Dodgers versus Padres I think Fuck the Padres! Fuck the Padres! We're gonna take this out of this.

And you know what? Fuck the Mets! Did you win? No! The fucking Mets plowed our asses. They fucked our asses. No! I mean, and I didn't even watch, but they fucked our asses.

I mean, I don't watch, I just look at the spoilers. Same! That's how I watch most of The End of the Walking Dead, too. If it's on at the restaurant or the bar, I'll watch it or whatever. Oh, I'm not gonna pay for sports, you idiot. Who does that? Who pays to have sports at home? I mean, I'll go sometimes. It's like, oh, at home. I don't know. Yeah, at home. I think I might have access to it somewhere. I don't know. I don't know how any of this works.

Okay, but like, everything that you're saying is, I I mean we see it right here in this passage, like these next few lines of like, you know, she's asking if he was always as slow, or did like losing his hand make him stupid and Jaime ignores it and he tells her that wildfires treacherous, she might burn down King's Landing if the flames get out of control, but she trusts Halleyn and his pyromancers and this exact like, exact um exchange happens right here of like let all of king's landing see the flames it will be a lesson to our enemies now you sound like aries her nostrils flared guard your tongue sir i love you too sweet." How could I have ever loved that wretched creature? She wondered after he had gone.

He was your twin, your shadow, your other half. Another voice whispered. Once, perhaps, she thought, no longer. He has become a stranger to me. Yeah. There it is. There it is. There it is. Tommen's wedding is modest compared to Joffrey's.

No one wants to pay for another wedding, nor do they really want to attend a fancy wedding, given all the circumstances. So in the Red Keep Sept, with fewer than a hundred guests, the children marry. Cersei is still in her morning blacks, and she thinks this is wrong. This is too soon since Joffrey's death. Okay, George loves using the word confection in these chapters. That's how he describes Margaery's dress in this one. He's having a lot of fun with feasts. Like, there's a lot of language about feasts and

parties and King's Landing in these chapters I've been noticing he's having a ball of feasts with. Oh. Yeah. Also, like, I think this is interesting how she's like, it's too soon, too soon. And I'm, I don't know if it's too soon or not since Joffrey's death, but I think it is precisely because of both Joffrey's death and specifically Tywin's death. Like, I think it's interesting that she's not like, it's too soon after Tywin's death, like I think it's interesting that she's not like it's too soon after Tywin's. But that's why this wedding is so rushed, because the Lannisters are in a fragile position, especially now that Tywin has died, it just also looks bad that all these kings are dying.

A hasty marriage is about securing the alliance. And also I will say what they're doing to Tommen here, what their family's going through in regards to how soon it's been since his brother died. It's not that different from Sansa getting married off just a bit after her father died and basically right after finding out her brothers died, they're not dead. But like she thought they were. She thought they were, that's what matters. And like that was all done for similar reasons, like they were in a war time and the Lannisters were making hasty moves to secure power over Winterfell through Sansa and this marriage is a hasty one during a power vacuum.

And I think there's just a lot going on here with this wedding. Like I, there's this line that Circe thinks of, you forced me into this travesty of a wedding, my lord, and I shall not soon forget it. And Circe thinking this way about Tom is thinking this way about Tommen, but I think you could say that this might be projecting her own feelings about her marriage, right? As she was wed to Robert Baratheon very soon after a time of very very big mourning, like it was a war, this is how they kind of ended the war, a big part of how they were able to do so. Many people died. It was to try to bring some

sense of peace to the realm and she was wed to Robert in order to bring safety and security to the kingdom and it was at the price of her own safety and security in a private sphere to her husband, who as we know, not only would he rape her, not only was there the marital rape, he would also hit her. I think that he hit her more than one time that Ned saw, which is why Joffrey internalizes that. But as we've discussed, she can't bring herself to still unforgettable.

Like, she's like, I won't forget this. I'm like, but you forgot that it was Tywin who did all this to you. Yep. Yeah. As you said last, last, the other chapter? Yeah, last week. Time is fake. Yeah, whatever time, whatever.

And it makes you wonder too how long it actually has been, right? Like, we know it's a shorter timeline between storm, feast, dance, etc. But three months? Six months? I'm curious how long it's really been. Yeah, I don't know. It makes me think of like, Damon and Raniera, right? Six months. Which is scandalous for like the opposite reasons, because they absolutely did fuck and a bunch of people died And it was like only six months Kind of the opposite here like Tommen's not going to fuck a bunch of people did die though. So I don't know something about that that

Line gets me that she says in Jamie one when they argue about the handjob and they argue about this wedding too Cuz he tells her you know you needed to go through with this Cersei, we're fucked. And she says, if it is battlefields you want, battlefields I shall give you. And that's kind of where she is about this wedding and about everything happening in this chapter, right? Like, she'll give them battle, she's lashing out, she's doing the only thing she can do, which is that. Yeah, and as a great philosopher said, love is a battlefield.

Mm-mm. You don't think? I mean... That's what's hap- Anyway. Um, wait, sorry, side thing, since we last spoke, they've scored one more time since that last update, Chloe. Alright, we will continue.

This is a call on our podcast that if you support the Padres, you don't support us. Taking of the song, we have our own baseball channel, Insider Baseball. No other sport's just baseball. Like you said, she looks at Mace thinking he forced her into this wedding. Soon, she would not forget it. She watches Tom and Cloak Marjorie with the cloth of gold Baratheon cloak and we learn about an argument that she had where she tried to push the fine red silk cloak Joffrey used for his wedding, citing her father and mother's love, but Olenna pushed back, saying it looked

unlucky and threadbare and a stag would be more fit for Robert's trueborn son. This is of course exactly like you said, showing the Lannisters don't have power. They don't have the upper hand. This is a grab to secure the throne, and they need to be the ones during this wedding to balk a little bit. To bend for the Tyrells. The Tyrells have a little bit of upper hand finally.

Absolutely, and I mean it's not just that right? Like they gotta establish this is actually Robert's heir and a Baratheon considering that as Cersei pointed out at the beginning of this chapter, Stannis holds quite a few places right now. So it is to their benefit that uh, Tominus perceived as a Baratheon and but like you know her hate for Robert which is understandable but also just she she's just got a lot of team pride as Alannister, right? Like yeah fuck the Padres. It's briefly outweighing her logic and she understands to an extent the trappings of power, but she forgets that even though House Lannister, yes, is very powerful, unfortunately this specific seat's power flows through

the Father when it comes to the Iron Throne. It is through Robert, and so like, here's that. But also, you know, the hotheadedness and like the loss of logic around all this. I don't think that's unique to her as Alex pointed out in their email. Like her brothers have it too, like for example, how we see Jamie gets his ass captured during the whispering wood and because he's like, fuck it, we ball. And he's like, I'm going to go, I'm going to go for Rob and they're like, er fuck it, we ball. And he's like, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go for Rob and they're like, errr, sir.

Literally, sir. Anyways, and then Tyrion, of course, has his moments, but Tyrion's forced to play it a lot more shrewdly than Jaime because he has to, because he is also not only made to feel vulnerable, but like, to an extent, he is, he is objectively, like, physically more vulnerable than Jaime. Until recently. Objectively like physically more vulnerable than Jamie until recently Yeah, I'm like Tyrion. I think you could totally add to this as hot-headed in many ways Like killing his dad and oh good point. That's a good call killing. He was ex-sex worker Killing dad was an impulse thing. So was killing Shay so true, You know, they're just, I was just so caught up in the moment that I committed a little light patricide.

I'm like Tyrion every chapter? If you want someone who's like more of a drama queen than Cersei, look no farther than Tyrion Lannister. No, literally though. Oh, so many chapters to cover up Tyrion someday. You never know when. He has like, what? Is it him or Arya? I know you did this. It's him. He's the most.

He has the most chapters of anyone. Outside the Sept, congratulations are given. Oh my god, congrats. Giles kisses her hand. Redwine kisses her on one cheek. Pycelle tells her, you haven't lost a son, but rather gained a daughter. Sure Pysel. Lyle Craighall says, Westeros has two queens, the young one as beautiful as the old.

Oh my god. That's nice. I would put this man in the tower as we burnt it off. She thinks that Lyle reminds her of, in quotes, her late and un-lamented husband. And as you were saying earlier, Robert is a specter. He hangs over this entire chapter for Cersei because, of course, we have these constant reminders that we must perform as Baratheons, and that's especially important on the wedding day. And we discussed a bit last chapter a question

of whether Cersei is treating Tommen the way that she was treated by Tywin, and I think in that way, like, if Tommen is to an extent like the subconscious projection that Cersei has, then this wedding obviously is triggering a lot of memories of the day that she herself was given away, right? Like, she wants Jaime there to protect Tommen on his wedding night, because no one was there to protect her from Robert on her own wedding night, especially that person being Jaime. Yeah, she wanted him to protect her. She wanted Jaime to protect her like he always did.

VB- Yeah. I mean, he wasn't there in all the other nights. So, who will protect Tommen? VB- She's like, I guess, I don't know, his dad. Just Kevin said. VB- Time to step the fuck up, Jamie. VB- And he's like, I don't know. I will not be the fuck up, Jamie. And he's like, hmm, I don't know. I will not be the dad who stepped up. Nope. Hell nah. Hell nah.

The dad that stepped too, maybe. Maybe Mace was the dad who stepped up for Dom. Oh god. I gotta shout out one of my favorite, I don't watch TikTok reactors or anything often, but there is this one guy, I think it's like reaction memes or something, I have to look up his name, but he's really fucking funny and he's watching through Game of Thrones for the first time, I'm pretty sure. And he uh, he has called Jamie a Young Stepper before. He is a Young Stepper!

He's very funny, I'll send it to you later, very funny. He cracks me up. He'll be like, this young stopper. Really funny. Kevin is one of the last to give Cersei congratulations, and she greets him, saying she hears he's off to another wedding. Lancel's. He mentions the Riverlands are too dangerous for Dorna to join him when she asks. Interesting, that obsession with asking where your hostage wife is. she asks, interesting that obsession with asking where your hostage wife is, he says Vargo, Hote, and Beric Dondarrion's crews are out there wrecking shit. He then asks if it's true that Sandor Clegane had joined the Outlaws, and she's surprised

that he's heard this already because a bird came the night before telling what happened at Saltpans, and she goes, reports are confused, LMAO. I think that's very funny. Reports are confused, that's true. That's so true, Brienne's gonna unlock all that for us. True. She pokes at him mentioning, "'Lancel would be eager to hunt down the outlaws, of course,

to restore peace to the Riverlands,' and Kevin's like, bitch, are you kidding me right now? Like, are you joking? You're looking me in the eyes and you're joking about this, that Lancel, our Lancel, would go fight Sandor Clegane?" Cersei and Kevin go back and forth about how Lancel's not the one to deal with Sandor, and Cersei suggests maybe you should go deal with Sandor, and Kevin gets a little angry looking and he's like, if I'm not required at the rock, sure. And Cersei's like, you were required here in King's Landing attendance present

indeed he is not at King's Landing right he is off in the world and she instead names her cousin Damien as castle in at the rock and Davin is the Warden of the West to spite Kevin. Interesting choices I don't even remember Damien. I remember Davin. Davin's got the beard. So she tells him to bring Sanders head and Tommen would be grateful. Joffrey liked the man but Tommen was afraid of him. When a dog goes bad the fault lies with his master, Sir Kevin said. Then he turned and walked away. I do appreciate that she's kind of playing 5d chess here, like no shit. You're trying to kill Kansal- kill Lancel? Kansal Lancel? Oh my god.

Kansal Lancel. Interesting campaign name. Kansal Lancel. Thank you. Kansal Lancel, da da da da da, Cersei and Adona and Tiwa. Kevin cannot kill Sandor. I'm just gonna put that out there. Like if they were fighting each other on a normal fucking day, no, he'd be toast. And it's interesting because there's so many dimensions here, right? Like, Kevin, you're only saying that when a dog goes bad, the fault lies with his master.

You're only saying that when a dog goes bad, the fault lies with his master. Right, you're saying that about Sandor. It's kind of clever because she's like, during Sandor's hat, Tommen would be grateful. Joff liked the man, but Tommen's afraid of him. So he's like, when a dog goes bad, the fault lies with his master. So he's saying Sandor-ish, but also he's saying Joffrey. Yes, yes. I didn't really think about that. That's the thing, like he's like, uh, and so he's implying it's her fault Joffrey was the way he was. Oh, yeah. Which is like,

sure, yeah, he said it before, but also... Robert existed. And who raised Cersei? Your brother, who you won't say a single word bad about? Yeah, also like... True- oh, good point. I thought you were talking about Cersei's brother, so I was like, what are we talking about? No, no, Kevin. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely regarding Ty Tywin and also I mean like, as Steph pointed out, that's the case between Tywin and Gregor, right? Gregor's like an even worse dog, first of all.

Yeah. And, I mean like, Joffrey had no dads who stepped up either. Mm-hmm. Okay? Absolutely. And it was too late for that,, unlike with Toppett. That's for fucking sure. It's also too late for that boy, though. That's true. I also thought it was another aspect to look at, is like, she threatens Lancel and Kevett instead puts himself

in front of him because he does love his son. That's very sad. He does. I mean, that's what he thinks about when he's dying and bleeding out, his son and his wife. Yeah. Jamie escorts her to the feast. She tells him that she blames him for this wedding, that he convinced her to let them marry, and that Margaery should be mourning Joff. She then adds that she doesn't think Margaery is a maid, that Renly also had a penis, going

back to that ale thing, which we were all like, I don't know about that. She starts rambling about Elena, and Jaime tells her that she's leaving on the morrow to Highgarden, and Mace is taking half of his strength to Storm's End, while the other half will join Garland at Brightwater. Soon enough, only Margaery and her ladies and her guardsmen will remain. And Loras, who Jaime views as kind of Tyrell agnostic, but Cersei is like, he's so Tyrell he pisses Rosewater. And Jaime's like, well, it wasn't my choice, but he'll do well enough.

The cloak changes you, and Cersei's like, it certainly changed you, not for the better. Wow, cold. Actually, she's really cruel to Jamie this chapter. It's- They're going through a breakup. They just need to end it. It's hot for me, you know? This is what I'm into. They don't know. They've never done it before, I guess. Someone should be mean to that boy. Anyway. Catalin was mean to him. Yeah, that was hot too. Yeah. mean to him. Yeah, that was hot too. Yeah. She heads to her place of honor beside the king and Margaery makes a show of kissing her good mother saying, we'll be very close and that she prays for Joffrey. We would have been so close that if I had known him before

his death, oh, I wish I could have. Oh, and so she's like you fucking lying bitch You conniving bitch And she's like in her head. She's like she wouldn't be so hasty to marry Tommen if that was true Which is also I mean true, but do you really think she wants to marry either of your fucked up incest children? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. That's me. That's true. That's actually a great point. No one wants that. Just like she wanted to marry Renly. Have you caught the theme in her three husbands? She's like, I guess this is a cuter McPoyle, but whatever.

It's still a McPoyle. Dress it up however you want. The feast is modest. Seven courses. Butterbumps and Moonboy entertain between dishes. Butterbump mission. Get it., butter bumping this, oh my god. Musicians play while they eat, the singer is one of Marjorie's favorites, uh, rip,

the blue bard, Nippilis, who sings some love songs and then departs. Olenna is heard loudly complaining, I wish I would have played the Reims of Castamere. She requested it. You gotta tip the DJ a little. Yeah. Whenever Cersei looks at her, she has a memory of Maggie the Frog come rushing back to her, and she says in her head,

All old women look alike, she tried to tell herself. That's all it is. Nah, girl, you hate women. That's what it is. This is so Selena Meier coded also. You can't tell them I'm a woman. President. Tom, why is it your hair? Oh my god yes you did it. Um alright you guys telling people that I'm Lady Stoneheart age is over telling people that I'm Lady Stoneheart age is over, telling people that I'm Catlin Sark age is over. Listen, Cersei is also my age, I found out today, and as someone who is aging, I don't know if any of you have experienced the concept of aging. No, not at all.

Not once. Seeing all the women look alike, that's all it is. It's just like not a productive line of thought. When we talk about internalized misogyny, this is part of it, and it's not unique to Cersei. Alright, I'm not saying Cersei's the only one who's ever done this. I live in a society. We see how it's a double-edged sword that will always come back to slice you, as we see in her Walk of Shame, when, you know, amongst the most common of the insults that has heralded her during the Walk of Shame over and

over again is sagginess, which is being used as a proxy for age. There are other things it could have been, right, but apparently, you know, no one can see her close enough. She still, she doesn't have any wrinkles. Good on you, girl, for, I mean, she's inside a lot, you know. on you girl for, I mean she's inside a lot, you know? And they talk about the sagginess, she says like she feels old and used and filthy and ugly, and she also like prior to saying that or thinking that tries to console herself that even if Robert didn't love her or even like her, at least he wanted her. And this also stands out with like in a few lines, she thinks that well most of Marjorie's beauty it's not really beauty.

She's just young, right? Which, you know, that people think that. And like, when I talk about this, I'm not judging, I'm not like judging Cersei for this line of thought or like how it undoes her later, because I think that this is a very real line of thought. This is something that like even I experienced not I don't think like all old women look like, but just like the anxieties around aging and what it means to lose your youth and not just like in a you know, oh, my back hurts kind of way. But like, I mean, this is just something that happens when you live in a society.

It all happens to all of us, yeah. You age someday. But especially when it comes to, you know, experience of like, when you put stock into your appearance as a woman and like, hair grows back but physical beauty fades. Like that's just it. And for some people, the hair doesn't grow back. And I'm just here doing what I can to beat the sands of time, beat against the sands of time.

It's all going to come for me eventually. And she, Cersei is building a path to her own demise here mentally by dismissing Olenna for her age and appearance. She's building her own prison. And like, I don't know, there's kind of like an irony around it. Like, yeah, sure. It's what it's the inside that counts. And the ironic part is Cersei's the inside that counts. And

the ironic part is, Circe wants the inside to count. She wants people to see her as smart. She wants people to see her as capable and strong and a leader. And she cannot for the life of her get people to respect her for it. Well, and it's fear, right? Like it's fear that it's coming for her. She punches down on young women. She punches up at older women. She hates the idea of aging. She hates the idea that it's coming for her to being alive, dying, living, all of it. She hates having the weight of having a fucking vagina and tits, right? Like she'll take it out on absolutely anyone who has them too, because everyone has found the secret except her to getting

rid of this fear, this existential dread that age and time is coming for her and in it death and loss and everything that she's fought for. There is no... There was something you said that I was gonna... Fearing time and aging and... Something about the secret or like whatever. There is no secret to getting out of it. Like it just comes for fucking all secret to getting out of it.

It just comes for fucking all of us. That's it. The secret is living. I mean, it's what he says in Quentin's chapters. Men's lives have meaning, not their deaths. Quentin's life meant something and the things he wanted meant something before he was sent by his father to go win over a dragon queen and got eaten by the dragon. He had a life.

He was living. He had memories and dreams, he kissed a girl and laughed about it and remembered it when he was young. And Cersei doesn't have that. Her youth was stolen from her. All she has are memories of an old woman sucking on her finger in a tent and sucking the blood out of her finger and telling her that all of everything she has is going to be a lie, it's going to be taken from her bit by bit painfully, and then she too will die. Yeah. And like, we all know, in theory, that we're gonna die eventually. Maybe you.

Yeah. I mean, me. But also just like, I say in theory because I guess some people are just coming back from the dead in this fucking book series. That's not real life. Unless some of you are undead amongst us, which... Hey, by the time these books finish, you never know what could be out there. I mean, who fucking knows, right? Elon is out there, man. He's making stuff. Dude, I think about like... Futurama and the heads and the vats, like... Who fucking knows? But, anyway.

Everything she's doing, she's doing to outrun death, and therefore does not live it. Doesn't live the life. Well, speaking of Maggie in the tent, we have the line here, she could still remember the smell of it, redolent with queer eastern spices and the softness of Maggie's gums as she sucked the blood from Circe's finger. Queen you shall be, the old woman had promised, with her lips still wet and red and glistening, until there comes another, younger and more beautiful to cast you down and take all that you hold dear. Wow, Egot.

It's Chloe. That was really good. She's the younger, more beautiful queen. Well thank you, that's so kind of you to say. No, people will be mad if we cast you down. You're so clever to have seen it. Do we just be like, POV's over, we're not finishing it. Jokes, jokes everyone, please don't be mad.

If you're mad, start your own podcast. Oh my gosh. Jokes, jokes everyone, please don't be mad. If you're mad, start your own podcast. Mace gives a toast, and the other sheep all baa-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a- really mad respect. The only persons who seem to remember her at all is Paxter Redwine, who, again, toasts to both of the queens, both young and old. I would just kill myself. We wouldn't get this far. I'm sorry, if this happened, I'd die. Like, I wouldn't even have to kill myself, I would just die of embarrassment, of shock, of like, bitch, you said this in front of a crowd. No. Nar. Nar. That was an attack, that was fucked up.

And I know I just went on that whole screen about like, you know, except aging, but I would kill everyone else. I would kill everyone else at this party first for being like, for agreeing. How dare you. How fucking dare you. And you have to smile through it? Like that's some straight up like, strong boys speech shit at a feast. Like that's fucked up.

No, for real, that was an attack. That was an attack. Petty spaghetti ass fuckin'... That was violence. There was blood drawn just then, and there must be blood drawn back, I'm sorry. I'm close, like I would just die from the wound, I'm like, no, I'm fighting. Alright, petty spaghetti. So, I mean, I'm just a Leo. It's like, what do you want? Lions are our shape. Anyways, you know, like Cersei feels overlooked here as queen and having power, and I kind of

think, like, as I think about the Casterly Rock shit, like, they're, ironically, I actually think she would have had more power as Lady of the Rock than she does at King's Landing because she's like fucking overshadowed by her eight-year-old son here and the Tyrells. At least in Casterly Rock, like theoretically they're all vile to the Lannisters, like the throne's just an illusion. She would have had a great time there, I think. That's part of it, right? Like she could have had a better life doing most anything. Uh, yeah, actually. She's trapped in that fucking fortress full of people's blood in the walls, and like lies and deceit. Like yeah, environment change, girl, you need it.

I think she would have really succeeded as like, I don't know, the Black Swan or some shit. Probably. I don't know, the Black Swan or some shit. Probably. I don't know. Maybe. Making... I'm just coming up with ideas. You know, something. Anything but this. Anything but this, my poor girl.

Of course, Cersei is drinking a lot of wine during this, which I would be too. This is sensible of her. Yeah! Oh my god. How else would you too. This is sensible of her. Oh my god. How else would you cope? And she's pushing her food around her plate. She's not really eating. Jane eats even less and she knows they're both anxious. She watches him leave to walk the hall. He's checking behind tapestries.

Lannister spearmen guard the building. Osmond Kettleblack, Marin Trant, Balen Swan and Loris Terrell guard the feast room. So pretty safe. And every time she looks over at Tommen, she sees in her head Joffrey instead clawing at his throat, coughing on the wine, went down the wrong tube, and it sends her into a panic attack. But suddenly it happens in real life. It's not just fake. This isn't just a thing in her head. Tommen is coughing. It did go down the wrong tube. Oh god, oh god. And she freaks out. Panic attack.

Marjorie comforts Tommen after he's okay. Things are fine. False alarm. And she says, you know, oh, you scared your mother half to death. And so he apologizes. He apologizes to his mom. He can't help it. It was more than Cersei could stand. I cannot let them see me cry, she thought. When she felt the tears welling in her eyes, she walked past Sir Meryn Trant and out into the back passage. Alone beneath the tallow candles, she allowed herself a shuddering sob. Then another. A woman may weep, but not a queen. voice and your reaction to my Tom and Boys last episode. You were so excited about it. It was that and Maggie the Frog this episode. Really gleeful. Really good. Yeah, we're in it. We're so in. Egot.

Seems for Eliana something. Raph. Grammy. Fuck. Other things. OT. OT. The Queen, interestingly, she separates it from the concept of womanhood, the Queen becomes some sort of gender other, capital O, but not those others.

Which is, I think, really interesting, right? The Queen can't show weakness, it has to perform power, these are all things that are considered masculine coded within the Westerosi society, but also At the same time you still have to perform femininity You have to like perform and show crying when you're mourning, but you're not supposed to be mourning here You know, this is obviously not the time but and again, I'm thinking of the the whole Allicent and Helena shit. Mm-hmm. Yeah It's only when it's on show for others that you should be crying, and when we can

profit from your tears. Not when you actually feel sad. That's silly. Yeah, silly and not usable. We can't use that footage. So of course, it is a woman's voice with accents of the East, Tyena Merriweather, who offers a handkerchief and accents of the East, Tyena Merriwether, who offers a handkerchief in comfort to the Queen, not just comfort, but also knowledge, court knowledge, that

Senel, Cersei's maid, is in Margaery's pocket, in her payroll, and she even uses the Queen's cousins to communicate with Margaery. Interesting. I also like how in this moment Taina does kind of like what Qyburn did when they were at Tywin's dead body, offers Cersei just like this small lie that she can use to to give herself some comfort, right? Like, oh you know Tywin wasn't really sleeping sleeping with Shae, he was questioning, and here she's like, Oh, you're weeping because your son is wed and he's leaving, not because of your fear and trauma of your past son dying at a wedding.

Yup, and I will say there is a lot of this in Cersei 4 that I talk about. That I referenced last week in Cersei 2. Watch out. We have a special guest next episode. A special guest expert next episode, it's Chloe. It's Chloe from Time Travel. God, you're so smart. You're so clever to have seen all this, Chloe and Aliana.

Fuck. No, but it's great because everybody speaks, like you can tell people speak to her in a certain way, the ones that want something of her and the ones that understand how she's easy to be appeased. Yeah. Tyena tells her to put her men in the gallery tomorrow and he'll see whichever man she chooses, so now whispering to Mega beneath the altar of the maiden at the Sept. Dun dun dun. Cersei's suspicious because, you know, she learned that from her daddy, and she wonders if this is a trap.

She's like, why are you telling me this? And Tyene is like, my loyalty is to my husband and my son. I want what's best for them. A likely story. BAM. I'll likely stop. Yeah. So the whole, like, you know, she's really just stoking the paranoia, and I kind of see now I see more of what Steph was saying regarding Teina maybe being in cahoots with Varys, because it operates a little similarly to the whole, like, all these little droppings, like the

coin to isolate and scare Cersei, and then later on, you know, when we're like, let's murder Kevin. It's all, like, when we're like, let's murder Kevin. It's all like similar ideas. Yeah, absolutely. And we talked about this actually a long time ago in Patreon episode 22. Oh, in the Free Cities series. A series we're going to finish as we travel east in our POVs, which happens in the next two POVs, by the way.

Traveling east. So true, Busty. I can tell you guys that. I can tell you guys that about the next two POVs, by the way. Traveling East. So true, Besty. I can tell you guys that. I can tell you guys that about the next two POVs. What can I tell you? They both might be Targaryens, depending on who you ask. They both are in Essos. If you ask people in the fandom that make YouTube videos, they might also agree with me on that statement

that they're both Targaryen. Or not, they might not. Or me on that statement that they're both targeting. Or not. They might not. Or not. Anything could really be happening. That's like all the P.O.P.s. They might be targeting.

They might not be. But in Mirror Mirror on the Wall, back in the day, we talked a little bit about the history here. When Tywin resigned as Hand, all that drama was happening. Owen Merriwether was the next Hand. Famously, he did not really have a great run. People think he could have maybe prevented the rebellion. It's a long story, we'll get into it.

But Owen was exiled because of Aerys's paranoia and also because he sucked as Hand. And he has a son, and that son is named Orton Merriweather. Wow! That boy grew up to be Orton Merriweather, and he marries Tyena in Mir, and they come back to Westeros when Robert pardons him. So interesting history to pay attention to, because you start to kind of see that maybe this is something that's been cooking for a while, this little scheme, right? And it's very interesting that you have directly in the chapter, a couple chapters before this, in Brienne 1, the background on the defiance of Dusk and Dale, right?

And we're introducing another Mirish woman who does a little bit of scheming and ends up getting murdered terribly for it, Serala of Mir. And it's interesting that it's bringing all these Aries info drops in so soon in this book and Serala of Mir reference so soon. I'm worried about Taina, man. Like I know she went back to Longtable, but when Cersei's free, if she finds out and when she finds out, I'm worried about you, girl. Well, even if she's at Longtable, I'm not sure that she's long for this world. Yeah, table that thought. Uh... yeah, I don't know what's gonna happen to her. Probably nothing good.

We have. Probably terrible things. I know, right? But it's feminist, because Cersei will do it to her. Oh my god. Just kidding, just kidding. God. The Queen could smell the other woman's perfume, a musky scent that spoke of moss and earth

and wild flowers. Under it she smelled ambition." And that's what Cersei's into. I think so. Like attracts like for her. Um, actually though, literally. Anyways, Cersei suddenly remembers that Taina testified at Tyrion's trial that the imp poisoned Jeff. She decides to trust Taina for now, saying that she'll be rewarded if this is true, but thinking that she'll be punished if it's a lie. And you know, you get that tip off in the writing,

using that dramatic irony to show that to the reader, that Taina can't be trusted because, you know, we all know it's a lie, even if Cersei doesn't. Yeah, absolutely. That's really a great point, because all of it, we're like sitting here like, so it's a lie. Yeah, so we're like, hmm, okay, so she just loves to lie. That's what Tayna's about. And being- I get it though, like- Yeah.

We'll get there. That's different. We'll get there when we get there. Yeah, we'll get there. We'll talk more about Tayna's sexuality as we get through this POV. Tayna then says that Cersei is kind and beautiful. When the queen returns to the hall, she finds Jaime pacing and he tries to calm her down.

She says that the wedding is a mistake and he says it's necessary. Tommen is safe. Fool, she says. No one who wears a crown is safe. Oh, she said the thing. To crown him is to kill him. She fucking knows. She knows.

She looks around, seeing Mace laughing with his knights, Redwine and Rowan chatting furtively. Kevin's brooding over his wine, and Lancel's whispering to a septin. Aw. She watches Senel serve Margaery's cousin's wine. Pysel's asleep. Listen. Listen. Let Pysel sleep. That man's sad. There is no one I can rely upon. Not even Jaime.

She realizes she needs to surround the king with her own people. Later, Margaery- What people? I know, right? Like, hoomst. Guile's, Rosby? Yeah, I think everyone will notice him. He's just gonna be coughing.

That's actually not a bad idea, like psychological warfare on Mace with Giles coughing. Mace hasn't been through COVID, but he has probably been through like, he wasn't alive during the Great Spring Sickness. Damn. I'm like, damn, he didn't know about the pre-COVID Great Spring Sickness world. Listen, illness just sucks. Being sick sucks. Yeah, fucking sucks. So later Marjorie and Tommen dance, looking ridiculous. Marjorie's a foot and a half taller than Tommen, and Tommen's clumsy, but he does his best, and immediately after,

Marjorie's cousins all insist that it's their turn. And resentfully, Cersei watches, thinking that half the court will be laughing at him behind his back, and it's like, no, they're laughing with him, he's just like, cute. But also, these are some Tywin-esque fears coming from her. She's so right. She is Tywin with teats. Absolutely, because this is literally what he did to them. Like this is literally what he did to them. Like, this is literally what he did to them.

Marjorie takes a turn dancing with her father and then with Loris. Cersei begins to reflect that they could be twins. Oh my god, this is so petty and I appreciate it. She's like looking at them and she's like, you know, a ripe crop of pimples would really teach them some humility, those fucking beautiful young bitches. Love it. Okay, she doesn't know.

We don't know that they haven't gone through a pimple phase. But you know what? It's enough to just let her take it, you know? This is, let her have this one. Sure. Let her have this one. She's having a hard life. She's having a hard life.

Jamie interrupts her musings, asking her to dance, and she rejects him, telling him, You can fill my wine, though. Can you, though? And he responds with, A cripple like me not likely, and leaves to circuit the room. She is left to fill her own cup. That's real. Embarrassing. Yeah. She refuses a dance with Mace and a dance with Lancel, and everyone starts to get the picture and starts avoiding her. She watches the cousins dance with each other and the knights, and watches Elinor drink wine with Arraign Waters.

She begins to study him. He's not quite as good looking as Rhaegar, his face is too narrow, his chin too clefted. They'll kill you for this, Arraign. But the Velaryons come from old Valyrian stock, all the same. She finds Kevin in a corner, speaking intently to Garland, wondering what they speak about, figuring it's treason. She thinks about the golden hand from Highgarden that they found in the jailer's chamber pot. When Sinell appears to fill her wine, she has to resist the urge, honestly, to strangle her. We have this line, a classic, I've left it in because

of that. Do not presume to smile at me you treacherous little bitch. You will be begging me for mercy before I'm done with you. Mm. Iconic. Mercy. At one point, exactly. At one point she hears Jamie say that her grace has had enough wine and seriously thinks that all the wine in the world would not be enough to get her through this wedding. Mood. Don't tell me what I've had enough. She rises so fast. Chloe should probably tell me what I've had enough.

Let's be real. She rises so fast, she almost falls, Jamie catches her and wrenches free, and she announces that everyone shall go outside to watch the Hans tower burn. They make their way outside, and she stares at the tower, wondering how many Hans had made their way home over there the past three centuries. She calls for Lord Halime to commence, and he waves his torch, commencing the archers from above to send flaming arrows into the tower. It becomes alive with light. Red, yellow, orange, and green. An ominous dark green. Bile. Jade. Pyromancer's piss. What the fuck. But they call it the substance. For the alchemist. A common folk call it wildfire, but the substance.

I love that we're getting it referred to as the substance because of the movie that recently came out, The Substance. Wait, what? What? Yeah, with Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley. Yeah, it's a horror movie. You won't like it, but yes, it's called The Substance. Is that why I don't know it?

Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, absolutely. You would not watch it, but very, very scary, creepy, whatever, horror. But also every time they say The Substance, it's all I think about. So every chapter I've been reading I've been like, wow, the substance with Demi Moore? One time I never finished this one. You can all, as we've discussed, listen to my Do You Want to Make Jon Snow song, Jon Snow song parody of Do You Want to Make a Snowman? Anyways, I started one of Wildfires Green

based on Wildest Dreams by Taylor Swift. That's it. From like, Circe's POV or something. And her saying burn it down because of the tower of the hand. Yeah. Let's see if I can resurrect that sometime. Some of the ladies- Like Sir Robert Strong! Cause you're resurrecting. Let's see if I can find it. Yeah. Oh, nice.

Yeah, yeah. Thanks. Some of the ladies gasp at the flames, others cheer, they make toast, seriously thinks it's beautiful. As beautiful as Joffrey was, but they laid him in her arms. And I'm like, is her going out there, like, watching the Tower of the Handburn and being like, look guys, the show, is this like the time I went to a wedding and they set off fireworks?

Is it the same? Yes, that is the same. Yes, that's the after show. Thank you. I also think it's very, it's very sad and contemplative that she's like, thinking of Joffrey here as she loses another son in some aspects and she's kind of come to terms of losing him in a lot of ways but kind of sad right like that is a moment a memory in time that she's now reflecting on like maybe she was happy then you

know and yeah she thinks actually she might have been a little. Yeah. Probably gave her something to love. Something to feel. She thinks no man had ever made her feel as good as when she had felt when he took her nipple in his mouth to nerfs. Interesting. Like, she had a purpose.

She was giving life to him, you know? That's true. Marjorie and Tommen watch the fireworks together. Margaery whispers in his ear and makes him laugh the whole time. We have a passage. Cersei thought of all the king's hands she had known through the years.

Owen Merriweather, John Connington, Carleton Chelsted, John Arryn, Eddard Stark, her brother Tyrion, and her father Lord Tywin Lannister, her father most of all. All of them are burning now, she told herself, savoring the thought. They are dead and burning, everyone with all their plots and schemes and betrayals. It is my day now. It is my castle and my kingdom." Really relates to what you were saying about the tower earlier, but also, you know, you know who

aren't dead? Tyrion and John Connington who are going to intersect. There's another way. There's another way. You're getting a lot of set up for things that are going to happen in the future books actually in Circe's chapters. Interesting. Good stuff. Margaery holds Tommen's hand and tells him that the flames are dancing just as they did earlier and Tommen turns to Circe to tell her, mother look they're dancing regarding the fire zone like oh yeah RIP. Oh though it makes me think, and everywhere they danced. Teara told in hours. Everywhere the dragons danced. Yup. You're next, Tommen, buddy.

Rip. He won't burn. He'll just probably, I mean... I think knives probably are poison, are more likely for him. Yeah. Oh God. Cersei's like, how long is the light show gonna go? And she goes, I see them Lord Halley, how long will the fires burn?

He goes, all night, Your Grace. Olenna is even pleased. All night long. All night long. Olenna is even pleased, saying it makes a pretty candle to guide them all to bed. She's pretty diplomatic, that Olenna. Yeah, you know, I mean, also, it's fireworks. Maybe some of you might not get it, but we're from the USA, so we're loud, pig-headed,

annoying, and we do fireworks. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, USA. No, I'm sorry, I can't do that in good conscience, god. We're gonna close this motherfucker out with a passage. Cersei back into Jaime. Lord Commander, escort his grace and his little queen to their pillows, if you would. As you command. And you as well?

No need. Cersei felt too alive for sleep. The wildfire was cleansing her, burning away all her rage and fear, filling her with resolve. The flames are so pretty. I want to watch them for a while. Jaime hesitated. You should not stay alone. I will not be alone. Sir Osmund can remain with me and keep me safe. Your sworn brother. If it please your grace,' said Kettleblack. "'It does.' Cersei slid her arm through his, and side by side they watched the fire

rage." The Light Showman. Great ending in terms of the journey of this chapter with the elemental difference of ending with fire When the chapter is opening with that threat of rain, you know really takes you really takes you through I love that because we're so used to the reign of like the Riverlands and the cat chapters and Great fucking call. I love that elemental differentiation going on here, and I love that Here Jamie almost kind of he doesn't say it or insist But he tries to push that he should be watching her where earlier they fight about who watches Tommen Yeah, it's like you know where you're supposed to be, Jamie. We've already had this discussion.

Why are you questioning it? And we know why. Jealousy, turning saints into the sea. Turning through the moon boy for all I know. Could it also be Blue Bard? Yeah. In his ear. You were quoting Tyrion. VB- I thought we were talking about who sang this song. VB- My bad. VB- Nope.

VB- I was moreover panning to the idea of, as Cersei has Maggie the Frog's words VB- reign in her head, he has Tyrion's doing the same, but different. VB- Obviously. VB- And that's Cersei III, folks! That's a fuckin' hell of a wedding! Yeah, it's, I mean, there's actually really a lot to discuss in that chapter in regards to Cersei. And you know what?

As Chloe knows, there's probably even more to discuss in Circe 4. That's my secret, but I'll never tell. Oh my god, XOXO. Ah, you know you love me, messiest bitch you know. Uh, thanks for listening to Circe 3. We will return next week with Circe 4. There's a small council meeting and a sleepover. It's gonna be a motherfucking blast. Eliana, if they have emails to send to us about Cersei Lannister, or tweets, where should they send them?

Well, you can send us tweets over on Twitter.com slash Girls Gone Canon. That's C-A-N-O-N. And if you have emails, I just assume you have emails now. When you want to send your email to GirlsGoneCanon, you can! At girlsgonecanon at gmail.com. And, of course, check out our Patreon, patreon.com slash girlsgonecanon. Every little bit that we get from our patrons, every big bit we get from our patrons that support us, it helps us put out these episodes every week for you and we're so happy that you can check it out over there. Check out all the special bonus episodes

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there are multiple channels for historic materials, A Song of Ice and Fire, there's a pet channel, which I think is probably the most important channel of all. Respectful Thirsting, because there's a channel for that. Come by, join the community, it's a lot of fun, and you won't regret it. As always, I've been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I have been another one of your hosts, Eliana. See you next week. Goodbye. Listen. El-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na Put some fucking salt, put some soy sauce on it or some vinegar, seriously, like chill. Chill chill chill.

Fuck the Padres. Goodbye. Fuck the Padres. I don't even know if I'm keeping all that in there. Goodbye.