Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 58 - ASOS Jon II

Episode Date: July 12, 2019

On this side of Jon’s newly released EP, we listen to “The Last of the Giants” and a teaser track of “Two Hearts That Beat As One.” He tries playing with a new band who are interested in doing a cover of “Wild Thing” as “Wildling,” especially because Jon really relates to that line of “you make my heart sing” amidst the dangers of playing the turncloak. But Jon wonders: at what point do I mean the words I sing?  AND an announcement for a VERY SPECIAL GUEST next week! :O :O Some links we reference:  A Cryptozoological Analysis of A Song of Ice and Fire - Part 1: Giants — https://old.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/1uruj5/spoilers_all_ah_what_the_hella_cryptozoological/?st=jxuy3khk&sh=71cb31bc  Sesame Street: Game of Chairs — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhWUFXvaZjo  Intro by Anton Langhage — Eliana's twitter: https://twitter.com/arhythmetric  Eliana's reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/glass_table_girl  Eliana's blog: https://themanyfacedblog.wordpress.com/  Chloe's twitter: https://twitter.com/liesandarbor  Chloe's blog: www.liesandarborgold.com   

Hello and welcome to episode 58 of Girls Gone Canon, John 2 in a Storm of Swords. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. You know me from the internet as at Liza Narber on Twitter, Tumblr, and LizaNarberGold.com. And I am Eliana, another one of your hosts. And you might know me as GlassTableGirl over on Reddit, on the Maester Monthly podcast, or maybe as Arithmetric over on Twitter. or maybe as Arithmetric over on Twitter. Hey, guys, we're excited to be here for another fun packed episode of Jon Snow. No frowns to be had here.

Everything's going great. No emotions. There's a lot happening. There's so much happening. Oh my god, this this episode is thick with two C's. Maybe even three, but definitely two. Definitely not part five of the dance of the dra- anyways, so. We have a Patreon episode, of course, coming out this July, and as all of you know, we have celebrated an important holiday here in the United States.

We are going to talk about northern independence pops bottles that sound like sirens it does maybe yeah northern independence bitches we're gonna talk about the north their struggle for independence how they once conquered all of the uh lesser kings of the north how they became the kings in the north when it made that switch from kings of winter over to king in the north all that we're gonna talk about all that good stuff in our patreon episode this month you can check it out when it comes out for five dollars on patreon five dollars a month gets you that some uh extra notes some other fun goodies you'll see if you join up and you get to enjoy all the past patreon episodes like last month's episode four of the dance of the dragons where we covered cregan stark coming south a lot of good parallels there with the end of the game

of thrones show if you've ever heard of it. So check it out. Patreon.com slash Girls Gone Canon. But speaking of Northern matters. Hey, week and a half or two weeks ago, we talked about a story that Warren had sent us. An Irish story of lore. And we got a couple messages because, of course, as much as I attempted to retain the two YouTube videos I watched on it, Irish is so hard, which our friend Neve has pointed out at Neom. It's Neve underscore in there somewhere.

She had said that she loved the episode and gave us a quick note of the pronunciations because Irish is hard about the hard G in Oge. Oge. I was there. And Oisen, which does not rhyme with hoisin sauce. It's actually oisin. We did talk about this last week, but it turns out you and I talk too much, so it got cut. But yeah, so Neve had told us a little bit of pronunciation guidance, and June also, our buddy June Coates had also written in so we will do better next time we're trying we're trying but it is hard it is a hard language I know a little bit of Scottish

pronunciations so you'd think I would at least get my shit together but I guess I never will thank you for writing in Neve and of course June for helping us learn a little bit more about the different cultures that inspire Song of Ice and Fire. Oh, that rhymes. Ooh, that was very rhyming. Yeah. Speaking of other things that rhyme, like poetry, let's talk about some of the themes about Jon's family and those sigils. We got some tweets from Lady of Chaos, a.k.a. Chaotic Pegasus. Oh, is she a winged horse lady?

Because, okay. I didn't realize until I listened to Girls gone canon on john in a game of thrones that john was running away and dreaming of living life in the shadows where no one would know or acknowledge him while having a giant white dire wolf most recognized on site facepalm emoji john is just peak chaotic energy. I didn't notice it until right now, but Lady of Chaos must be the, like, authority on chaos. Her screen name is Chaotic underscore Pegasus. She's the Lady of Chaos. So her telling us about John's chaotic energy,

that's like, that's peak Lady of Chaos. I mean, she, yeah, as you said, she's an authority. She gets to decide what's chaotic and not and she's teaching us and i i just thought that was hilarious and i loved it you know uh lord commander mertens one of our friends michael he had responded with it's big teenager energy you want to be alone and not bothered but you also want people to think you're great and special it's's so true. It's so true. I love that this lord and this lady came to assist us in our time of need. These are the banners.

Yeah, raise the banners. Lord Commander Mertens. Cheers. Here's to you. Raise a glass of Dornish's Will. Here's a glass for Lord Commander Mertens. A glass for Lady of Chaos. Thank you.

The Lady of Chaos. I love it. And I have some exciting news. Do you want to hear it, Eliana? I always want to hear exciting news. Well, we have a friend coming on

next week. Yeah. Episode 59. We're going to have a friend. Yeah, almost nice. Almost nice. Okay. 59 almost nice almost nice okay John 3 we kind of wanted to make it a threesome for our cave episode

so we invited on Vanessa Cole from the Knights cast yes I like that you're gasping you just gasped like you didn't know did you not know we did this I didn't know I wanted to be surprised and excited all over again so i made myself forget you told me to forget sir yes we are getting vanessa cole from night's cast she is

coming on our people talk to her people uh it's all a-okay red eminem's only in the green room she'll be here for john three so we hope you get to listen and enjoy with us uh we're gonna have a fun time staying in that cave with vanessa i'm sorry yeah and this has been a long time coming we've been trying to find it it has wait you mean sing in the cave oh let's keep i'm keeping that guys this pun was not intended, but let's- I'm trying to regain myself. This episode

with Vanessa has been in the pipeline for a while. Oh my god. In the pipeline for a while. That's not any better. The clone? god in the pipeline for a while that's not any better we're gonna get ourselves together by the time vanessa comes on we're gonna we're gonna arrange ourselves we're gonna arrange ourselves by the time she comes on sorry vanessa anyway so we've been trying to find an episode that makes sense

for her to come on we know that she has a lot of great thoughts on john and also really loves egret and we thought this was going to be a perfect chance to have her talk about these two characters and she's done some amazing art of egret if you haven't checked it out we've talked about it on previous podcasts we'll have to share it again uh we'll give you a link to her profile because it is just good. Yes. And of course, if you are excited about Vanessa coming on and haven't heard her yet, absolutely check her out over on the Knights cast. Yeah, the Knights cast has some great episodes. They did a lot of great show coverage and they're moving on to cover some other things coming up about Game of Thrones and

I'm also really excited I hope they cover some of Blood Moon when that comes out oh yeah I think they're gonna have some great takes on Blood Moon so I'm looking forward to that and they're still they're still making episodes and they've got a really fun cast and both Chloe and I are excited to collaborate with Vanessa again yes we've had a lot of fun. We got to be on with them. Was it episode five of season eight? I think it was four. Yes, yes, it was episode four. Yeah, it was a fun time, though.

It was a little bit right after Ice and Fire Con. I'm excited to get back together with her. We will see how it goes next week. Yes. But as always, that throws us into our lightning round. Eliana, are you going to start us up? Spark us up? So, Daenerys won.

Jorah decides to project on a 14-year-old girl some more. And he tries to turn her away from Aristan, who actually offers her some knowledge on her family. Thought you'd appreciate that. Yeah, I do. Always. Bran won. Bran masters controlling his third eye. Jojen warns Bran of spending too much time in Summer's skin and pushes them toward the wall. Davos 2.

Davos is taken into arrest upon scheming to kill Melisandre after his arrival to Dragonstone. Jaime 2. Jaime too Jaime takes a trip down ye olde memory lane On his time as a knight While staying in an inn with Cleo Spray And Brienne of Tarth Tyrion too Tyrion catches up on court gossip

And personnel change In a visit to Varys And uses him to get a last visit with Shae But Tyrion Finds himself unable to send her away for her own protection. Arya too. Arya and co. come across some king's men in the woods.

Catelyn too. Rod returns from the west and Catelyn finds herself getting out of punishment for letting Jaime go free pretty easily. He's lost the phrase and married a girl from the crag? That leads us right into John 2, while John surveys Mance's army or else Eagle attacks him. Rattleshirt takes him to see Mance

at the Fist of the First Men, and some of John's lies are unraveled. He must tell Mance the truth of the Watch's size, and the situation is tense until egret pipes in saved by his very own spear wife john is assigned to a task force that climbs the wall the next day so you get to say pipes in all right all about that pipe work okay we're gonna get ourselves together by next week the first line no we're not because the first line of this chapter isn't big enough for you that's what torment says to john that's the chapter opening all right and then john walks with torment and sees all of these giants mounted upon snuffle up a guy ahead and snowflakes are settling in their hair in john's arc snowflakes have always been very reminiscent of him remembering his

family and times with them and goodbyes with the stark siblings and we're starting to see part of him drift between that fantasy of belonging home at winterfell those people but also belonging with this people the other half is trying to desperately stay separate but at the same time this is kind of becoming a family in a way ghost doesn't like the sneffle up a guy and so he silently snarls at them and backs away john then loses count of the giants emerging in the pale mist and he thinks that there must be hundreds pale mist i was also thinking i was like oh mist. He remembers old Nan's stories. In old Nan's stories, giants were outsized men who lived in colossal castles,

fought with huge swords, and walked about in boots a boy could hide in. These were something else, more bear-like than human, and as woolly as the mammoths they rode. They're not wearing skins, John realized. That's her. Shaggy pelts covered their bodies, thick below the waist, sparser above. The stink that came off them was choking, but perhaps that was the mammoths. And Jormun blew the horn of winter and awoke giants from earth. He looked for greatswords ten feet long, but saw only clubs clubs most were just the limbs of dead trees some still

trailing shattered branches a few had stone balls lashed to the ends to make colossal mauls the song never says if the horn can put them back to sleep so i love all the detail that we get on the giants upon first seeing them and not going to talk too long about it but there was this really fun post back in 2014 by user I hate fountainhead over on reddit where he created a cryptozoological analysis of a song of ice and fire part one giant cryptozoology is like you know fake zoology it's fun and talks about all of the different biological features and things about the giants and how they would have evolved to have these features based around this pseudoscience. It's just a really fun series, and they also made a couple more. One of them is about the children in the forest.

We'll drop a link. It's just fun. Check it out. Yeah, lots of science-y stuff. Really good. I love that the idea of the song never says if the horn can put them back to sleep it reminds me of pandora's box a little bit right like all of a song of ice and fire has that same dangerous feel to it that like all these dangers and evils have been let loose there's

no way to really put them back in but there's still kind of this hope that the children of the story especially carrie throughout the entire journey and especially the starks like john and it also makes me think a little bit of hesiod's work and days the poem it it makes me think of the knight's queen almost as a pandora figure and maybe she's some sort of symbolism of the Odyssey and an answer to the evils in A Song of Ice and Fire. Because in Hesiod's work in Days, the gods contribute to making Pandora. Hephaestus is the god of blacksmiths and metalworking, etc., etc., who creates Pandora on Zeus's orders. Athena dresses her up in a silvery gown and gives her some skills.

Aphrodite gives her grace and longing, and the other gods gods give her jewels and Hermes gives her lies and deceit. She later opens a jar that got translated into being a box given to her and it consists of oh all the bad shit in all the world ever. And the metaphor is that now it's all women's fault. So just keep that in mind. But the very first woman eve in some fictional stories as well have a lot of similarities right and i think maybe we're looking at the wrong thing here that it's not the night's queen and eve and uh pandora that are the blame takers here they shouldn't take the blame these mythos ladies it's likely the man for wanting them, right? Blame men. Always.

I say always, but always. I say that because in Theogony, one of Hesiod's pieces, one of the earlier stories of Pandora, from her is the race of women and female kind of her is the deadly race and tribe of women who live among mortal men to their great trouble. No help mates and hateful poverty but only in wealth and then you get in brand four in a storm of swords that line about the night queen

or the night's queen or the night king his chick that he stole whatever a woman was his downfall a woman glimpsed from atop the wall with skin as white as the moon and eyes like blue stars fearing nothing he chased her and caught her and loved her though her skin was cold as ice and when he gave his seed to her he gave his soul as well there's just a lot similar there and it reminds me of how wanting is kind of that death of your story and john and egret is kind of like this as well. A woman was his downfall, right? A woman glimpsed from atop the wall. see it often manifested through a woman. We see people projecting things onto women a lot in A Song of Ice and Fire and it leading to their downfall, regardless of whether the woman does anything or not, right? And I think to John's virtue, he doesn't do that. And he tries to stand by his values regardless.

And I mean, we keep coming back to this quote, but you were wrong to love her and you were wrong to leave her. Just because we feel like getting sad. It's time to get sad again. We just got here. So Torben speaks to a giant who has a spattering of gray fur all over him. And once more, John, in typical John fashion, asks, is this one the giant's king? And it's like, no, John. No, you're wrong again.

Because John is very obsessed for some reason with trying to identify the kings that he sees like in other cultures or even within his own. And then he learns that giants actually have no kings. And the way that Tormund phrases it is like giants have no kings no more and mammoths do nor snow bears nor the great whales of the gray sea he's saying that like nature doesn't really have kings and he ends it but I know your kneeler's knees must be itching for one of some king to bend to once again though Jon's expectations on what a king looks like are subverted because like they just don't have kings but it also gives us a starting

point for John's understanding of these other cultures finally because especially north of the wall like this actually makes it much more meaningful when he has to be the one in dance explaining to like Stannis like no dude people don't follow lords and kings or

they don't like marriage alliances don't mean what you think they do. Because it's not like down here. It's completely different. Like this is exactly John learns from this and he is skeptical, which is really interesting, especially since at the very beginning of the books, he's sitting there going, they'll send someone to help the watch, won't they? And then a king finally shows up to help the watch won't they and then a king finally shows up to help the watch he's like dude that's not how any of this works you know that right like this is not you it's like when you've been through a merger and you get a new manager

and you're like good luck that's a perfect example actually yeah that was a very good example now that i think like a merger but it's multiple right it's like a big company coming in and they're trying to merge several things and they're like do we buy this other company too and john's like we need to buy the other company also and everyone's like no we don't want them he's like we need them they have no worth and you're like what the fuck and he's like no we need them they're gonna die so Tormund and the giant have actually a really funny exchange I won't go into it deeply but basically they're like you're inbred no you're inbred

and it's just like this back and forth oh my god no you're non oh thanks and that was a really good pun thank you really this is a good exchange everyone this is better than the one that was in the book let's be real you're hired Tormund speaks the giant in the old tongue and

so David J. Peterson who wrote the languages for HBO uh for Game of Thrones I he's coming to Ice and Fire Con next year it's been announced no I have so many questions for him and uh I want to ask him you know like do you have any of the old tongue written? Because they didn't do anything for the old tongue on the show. But I do want to know, like, maybe he has an idea of what he wants it to sound like even. Because the First Men not only had a language, they also spoke in runes. Like House Royce, how they have the runes on their sigil. Yeah, those were First Men runes.

In the World of Ice and Fire, the Iron Isles section, they talk about this. The First Men spoke in runes. And George has also said before in A So Spake Martin that he didn't have the whole language in his desk the way that Tolkien did. You know, Tolkien's a philologist. He's an Oxford Don. He could spend decades working and inventing Elvish in its detail and George is a hard-working sci-fi and fantasy novelist and he doesn't really have

that same gift he hasn't had not at this point I think this was like early early early 2000s created a Valyrian language so David J Peterson pretty much created that he was the language master so that's really cool that george just like had no vision for it but david listened and he created very cool yeah yeah he built like entire systems and languages out of them you can i think see them on dothrocky.com or org one of those yeah and they're on duolingo if you log into du know that. That's fun. Do you want to learn one with me? We could do that. I have cousins in the Philippines who were really into

Lord of the Rings and they learned Elvish for a while. Would you rather learn Dothraki or would you rather learn Valyrian? I think Valyrian's more useful, I guess. Let's learn Skroth, even though David never put it in the show. It sounds sounds like crackling ice and very metal

but I don't think it's on there we've listened to it I already speak it so something else of note in this passage it's something that we learn eventually in some Bran chapters in Bran 2 and A Dance with Dragons for example we don't get a lot in the old tongue

but we do get this phrase woe dock nag gran and lot in the old tongue but we do get this phrase woe doc nag gran and that in the old tongue means squirrel which is what the giants call the children of the forest and that's from brand two in a dance of dragons and in the true tongue that means those who sing the song of the earth that was before even the old tongue was spoken this was like before the giants talk and i love that this gets brought up because in bran 2 in a game of thrones ned calls bran a squirrel for climbing the tower that's such a good connection i really like it and there's even this bit later on in a storm of swords in aria 3 where aria says to greenbeard that she's not a squirrel and greenbeard

says that she's a little gold squirrel who's off to see beric dandarian whether she wants to or not and then again in a storm of swords in aria 6 she gets called an angry squirrel by greenbeard and then if you scoot forward to bran 2 and a dance of dragons again bran thinks that leaf is his sister aria uh he says and yet there she was whirling a scrawny thing ragged wild her hair a tangle tears filled hodor's eyes and froze there yeah i think that's such a great connection and this is clearly like something that george is like putting together later on but it all comes together really well and aria of course we see has a gift for also skin changing not as well as bran obviously you don't know if she's like i don't know in the middle between she's learning yeah she's like probably on par with john maybe a little

less right because she's still only learning about it but she has other animals such as cats none of these are squirrels but you know right now they're all just kind of she's a secret squirrel i've been waiting for so long to do that hey there's also this part that kind of translates to a dance with dragons where we talked about in theon's chapters how rowan had a name that was very godly and connected with trees and we talked about you know just different symbolism there but also Squirrel the washerwoman kind of connects there and she's great John wheeled and followed Tormund back toward the head of the column his new cloak hanging heavy from his shoulders it was made of unwashed sheepskins, worn fleece-side in as the

wildlings suggested. It kept the snow off well enough, and at night it was good and warm, but he kept his black cloak as well, folded up beneath the saddle. I love this quote. It's got so much in here that tells John's story, because it's not just the girl and women characters who tell their story through their clothes. John's story is full of it as well because we know he's nervous about pretending to join the wildlings, but George conveys it here by talking about that new cloak hanging heavy on John's shoulders. And it shows the weight of this decision and that responsibility that turning cloak is a burden on him because of that weight because it's heavy and then along with that we know that john has two cloaks and this tells us about john's internal conflict and where his heart truly lies

we see this with other members of john's family for example sansa kept sandra's cloak showing that even when someone wasn't a knight nominally, she held onto the ideas and the values that the stories taught her about what true knighthood is because she saw it through him. Oh, are you not gonna...

I'm gonna, but I was just being proud. Because you literally changed what you were gonna say. You were gonna say he wasn't a true knight, and then you said even though nominally he wasn't a true knight you changed it you were trying to say overall you knew you knew better it's because i actually like miss remembered the quote because the one who's not a true knight is gregor that's what it's about well sansa thinks that sandor is also not a true knight she thinks like he was true knight, but he saved me all the same. But yes, Sansa holding on to those ideals and values,

and there's that whole entire thought that, quote, she had kept the cloak, you know, beneath her summer silks in her cedar chest. She could not say why. And she draws strength from that, in the same way that Jon is drawing strength from that black cloak that's hidden beneath his saddles here because not only that it's his version of aria's needle right like she hides it from the faceless men but she can't bear to get rid of it even though she's gotten rid of everything else because needle for her is home it's her family

it's john snow's smile so john keeping and hiding that black cloak is symbolic of his loyalty to the night's watch and as we see later on what he feels is his duty to protect his family and he doesn't take that duty nor does he wear this new cloak lightly and it's really what you said it's it's strength it's really what you said it's strength it's what keeps them going right this is what they're holding on to this is what's keeping them going it's like when Sandor says in Game of Thrones that what kept you going hate

this is what kept Sansa going the fact that you know like there's that one piece of knighthood that does exist in the world it is real and there is good in the world and she's going to keep following it. You know, that's what this is. And for John, it's him holding that black cloak and saying like, there is good and I will follow it.

Yes, absolutely. And then we get this exchange. And Chloe has put here in caps that it would be rude not to do it for the people. And, you know, we were givers, you know, we're benevolent. We are. We're going to do it. We really, really are. I'm ready.

Are you ready? I guess so. Is it true you killed a giant once? He asked Tormund as they rode. Ghosts loped silently beside them, leaving paw prints in the new fallen snow. Now, why would you doubt a mighty man like me? It was winter, and I was half a boy, and stupid the way boys are. I went too far, and my horse died, and then a storm caught me. A true storm, not no little dusting such as this. Arr! I knew I'd freeze to death before it broke,

so I found me a sleeping giant, cut open her belly, and crawled up right inside her. Kept me warm enough, she did, but the stink near did for me. The worst thing was, she woke up when the spring come And took me for her babe Suckled me for three whole moons Before I could get away Ha! There's times I miss The taste of giant's milk, though If she nursed you, you couldn't have killed her I never did

But see, you don't go spreading that about Tormund giant's bbane has a better ring to it than Tormund Giantsbane and that's the honest truth of it a few thoughts coming off of this first this is his we used to climb 20 miles uphill both ways in the snow

this is his like when we were young stupid boys I remember my dad would tell me stories like one time he told me a story about how he pissed off of like a like a bridge and peed on cop cars or some shit when he was younger like you know just crazy like stupid shit that they did when they were boys this is like a you know how young boys are we're idiots uh but also second second of the third tormund giants babe this is where that starts. This is a good nickname for him.

I love Tormund Giants Babe. And my third thing is this is actually where the show took that whole Tormund milk moment from season eight, if you recall. And it made me really happy. It was just nice that Cogman had noticed this and talked about it. Yeah. Cogman, he tried. He tried to make things happen. Episode two was great.

Funny aside regarding walking uphill both ways, I guess it's not in the snow, but it is possible to go both ways uphill. In San Francisco, apparently, my friends did it because they took some crazy route when they were going back and forth from somewhere. But also, Tormund not killing the giant kind of reminds me of Jon sparing Ygritte though I guess Tormund was kind of fine with the giant dying or else he wouldn't have cut her open

in the first place which thus then also kind of reminds me of course of the Tauntauns in Star Wars because there's no way that this isn't inspired by that i refuse to believe that this is not inspired oh yeah but circling back to that thought about tormund not killing that last giant quote unquote you know that whole especially with the song the last of the giants obviously that's kind of how we feel about this right is that another thought of like john killing the last of the dragons anyways we'll get back to that soon. John asks him where his other nicknames come from, but he specifically thinks about the last one, Hornblower. And he wonders if Tormund is going to be the one to bring down the wall

and if Mance may have given him the Horn of Winter that they're looking for. And of course, so instead of the story that John really wants, Tormund tells him the story of how he fucked a bear. He was snowed in, he had a hankering for a sweet, young, fantastical thing that lived nearby, and he left. He found a woman with a temper on her, but it turns out it was a bear. All ripped and torn I was, and half me member bit right off. Ripped and torn I was, and half me member bit right off. And there, on me floor, was a she-bear's pelt.

And soon enough, the free folk were telling tales of this bald bear seen in the woods with the queerest pair of cubs behind her. Ha! So, this is the birth of all of the crazy Mormont theories that it was probably Mage Mormont, and that he's the father of all of the Mormont theories that it was probably Mage Mormont and that he's the father of all the Mormont girls. Fun fan theory. What do you think? It's cute. I don't think it's true. I don't think it's not true. I don't think it matters. I will say I have that, you know, I think that Rob's will, which is of course with Mage Mormont right now,

Bob's will, which is, of course, with Mage Mormont right now, somewhere, allegedly, if she brings it to Jon. Well, if she makes it all the way up to Jon and tells him about it at the wall, that's an intricate, I think, plot device for getting Mage and Tormund back together in the same room. Yeah, I think it's stuck at Howlin' Reed, so. But the ship. So John asks what Tormund would do if he found that bear again, since she already bit half his dick off. And Tormund's like, well, my dick is so fucking

big that it doesn't really fucking matter, Jon Snow, how much of my dick she bit off, because it's still huge. I love Tormund. Yeah yeah it is kind of awkward though this like scene i'm like oh she fought back whatever i guess yeah it's a little uncomfortable maybe don't fuck a bear torment uh he asks john if he's a eunuch if the rumors about joining the wall are true if they truly gel you and john's like pretty offended he's like um he's waiting for torment to be like prove it prove your dick still there and torment's like if you have a dick why isn't it in egret already no one believes you everyone in the group knows you guys are like a thing and john's like i'm a man of the watch and he's like

blushing and he's like why am i blushing if i've you know abandoned the watch it shouldn't matter right i like that the language is he's like blushing like a maid and i'm like that's because you are a maid john yeah like when he thought about uh kissing and how he's like it was like kissing a maid and we're like okay fire doesn't feel like that you don't know okay so he rides with egret and tormund most of the days which is a suggestion for mance when he first joins because most of the free folk don't trust him they find him a crow and an oath breaker and it's not very you know respectable thing to be each night egret lays her sleeping furs next to him no matter what he does and she cuddles up to him so he starts to use ghost as a barrier between them

and it reminds him of this tale that old nan would tell old nan used to tell stories about knights and their ladies who would sleep in a single bed with a blade between them for honor's sake but he thought this must be the first time where a direwolf took the place of the sword. You know the butterfly meme, the is this blank meme? I'm gonna do that on our podcast, IRL.

Is this gestures butterfly foreshadowing? The direwolf took the place of the sword. So the direwolf stands in between Jon's honor and his love for Ygritte. And I can imagine that's going to keep coming in the future, especially if what we saw on the chair show, the fancy iron chair show, if that comes true with the season finale and series finale. Because we get that line that love is the bane of honor the death of duty what is honor compared to a woman's love and here john's honor is the dire wolf in between him and the

woman him and the lady the knight and the lady yes and it's like his family standing between it and i i love the last of the starks yeah that you phrased this because I couldn't figure out. I was like, this is meaningful, but I can't figure it out. But you got it. Side note, you described it as the chair show. I think, what was it? Sesame Street or The Muppets? One of them actually did a parody of Game of Thrones.

Sesame Street. Yeah, they did a parody of Game of Thrones. And they actually called it the musical chair show or something. And did a parody of musical chairs as Game of Thrones it was great that's beautiful I love it I'll link it it's actually hilarious it's really good and then it's another day

and Jon says he wants a hot bath and Ygritte's like you stupid spoiled bitch because you have to take a cold bath. And it's actually way better, she says, especially when you have someone else to warm you up afterwards. And he's like, but our clothes are going to be wet and cold and that kind of sucks. We're going to die from freezing or exposure. She's like, you don't wear your, come the fuck on, John.

You don't wear your fucking clothes, dipshit. And he's like, I'm not going in at all, so it doesn't matter. And he rides off with Tormund, fucking emo bitch. I know, I love that John's such a teenage boy in this moment because, you know, he's just like, I'm just not gonna bathe, which is like teenage boys learning hygiene.

Not only that, but it's like avoiding a girl. All of it, all of it, everything. Amazing. Love it. He wants to be... What did Michael Yates... What did Lord Commander Merton say? Chaotic. You want to be

alone and not bothered, but you also want people to think you're great and special. Take a shower, John. Then we can talk about you being great and special. Actually, that's true. If you take a cold shower, right? That's the joke. If he takes a cold bath, that should take care of things too, won't it? Oh my god, it'll

take care of some things, because they'll just invert into him. That's what Tormund says will happen if you don't use it. Yeah, exactly. So it's happening to him one way or another. The wildlings, though, seem to think that Ygritte is special and beautiful because of her red hair she's kissed by fire they say and john's like well she's not traditionally pretty uh and by that he

means courtly beautiful like shut the fuck up john but she still stirs his loins especially when she sits near the flames with the light in her hair and she smiles at him or if she sings him a song i like what you caught last episode you talked about the flames capturing egret's beauty and how you thought about denarius in that moment and her flames and that kind of foreshadows his romance with her to come and the fire probably won't really be seen as beautiful eventually right when it comes to danny uh maybe if she's burning people possibly but later in this chapter we learn john thinks egret reminds him of aria in a way which of course kind

of weird you know 93 pitch letter vibes where aria tyrian and john had a pretty serious love triangle i digress it brings up some mighty big liana comparisons too i'm sure we'll bring that up more throughout this chapter and in the next couple chapters. But a lot to think about when it comes to him thinking of Ygritte and looking at Ygritte and how he views her. Yeah, he decided, I guess, to steer away from the Arya and the straight up Evangelion plot

and just go for like the Evangelion light one. Oh my god. I'm not joking. But he was a man of the night's watch he had taken a vow i shall take no wife hold no lands father no children he had said the words before the weirwood before his father's guards he could not unsay them no more than he could admit the reason for his reluctance to torment Thunderfist, father to Baz. I'm still grinning every time

you say the voice. Thank you. I'm still excited every time. Honestly, it's very exhausting, but it's worth it for the people. It's worth it for me. Yeah, for you mostly. I will sacrifice you for me. Wait. Wait. Are you sure you sure Annie is this you

oh perfect Dormin doesn't understand why Jon won't just bang Ygritte because she obviously likes him and he's like I'm pretty sure you like her too and Jon's like uh I am too young to get married

and Dormin's like um I'm pretty sure you like her too. And John's like, I am too young to get married. And Torben's like, nobody said anything about marriage. Fucking virgin. M2M's Don't Say You Love Me plays in the background. And John's like, but she stood up for me. I can't dishonor her by giving her a baby. You guys, it's because he's a bastard. He doesn't want to have a bastard because he is a bastard. Yeah. That was subtext bastard because he is a bastard. Yeah.

That was subtext. It really is, though. And like, Jon's rationale here in this conversation is just such a perfect echo to the chapter that comes right before it. Like the language that he uses, where in that cat chapter, she learns that Rob has just wed Jane Westerling because he would not dishonor her. But really the whole time Rob was thinking about Jon because this is a thing that Jon thinks about. But also Tormund's like, we have birth control up here.

Moon tea. Like if Ygritte doesn't want a kid, she could just go in the woods and then bleed for two weeks really thickly and she's gonna be in pain so she'll probably double over a lot sorry i've seen it happen uh depending on the tea so sylphium so spelled s-i-l-p-h-i-u-m the exact identity of the plant sylphium is unclear because it's a now extinct plant it was maybe a giant fennel but it was used

so extensively in ancient medicine for a lot of things, for coughs, sore throats, fevers and especially as a contraceptive and abortifacient yeah that it was basically used to extinction

so now we don't have this thanks tansy so john thinks a strong son or a lively laughing girl kissed by fire where's the harm in that oh sad oh just for a second he lets himself think that just for one second Oh. Sad. Oh. Just for a second, he lets himself think that. Just for one second. What is the harm if you're gonna start a new family?

Where the others are. I hope he gets to, man. I hope if the chair show is correct, which it is, I mean, George said it would be, so if that's really what happens i hope maybe val is there waiting for him dude i don't know i hope he gets some happiness i don't think he's fertile regardless i yeah dying must do something to your semen dying and being a zombie

has to do something to it i mean look at your stepmom she didn't turn out so hot yeah agreed for sure for sure torment is incredulous at john's pure stubbornness though at fathering a bastard he's like well go find a beer then because if you don't do something as we said torment thinks your dick's gonna get smaller and smaller until it disappears. Sean starts to think about the free folk and he thinks, They have no laws, no honor, not even simple decency. They steal endlessly from each other, breed like beasts, prefer rape to marriage, fill the world with base-born children. Yet he was growing fond of Tormund Giant's vein. Great bag of wind and lies, though he was. Long spear Tormund giant's bane great bag of

wind and lies though he was long spear as well and egret no I will not think about egret but I love that because he starts off harshly thinking like fuck these guys they suck they have no ethics you know like no ethics no

mission statement and then he's like but Tormund's cool and long spear's all right as well and egret no i don't like i don't even care about her i don't care about you i don't whatever whatever whatever take a cold shower john uh get in the cave yeah while people like egret and torment make his time in the free folk easier there are still other like really wild people yeah it is to watch out for people like stir the magnar of then i actually really like stir uh his people think he's more of a god than a lord which is interesting because that's something that happens uh that's something that's an ongoing theme throughout the song of ice and fire

you have harm a dog's head and she's a chunky woman who hates dogs and kills a new one for her banner every day. Horrible. Hello, 911? PETA? The police? I'm calling the police? I just am like, I don't know. She doesn't fuck with dogs and she doesn't fuck with me.

She does fuck with dogs. That's the problem. So she hates dogs so she kills a new one to hoist onto her banner every day is this partial red wedding foreshadowing because later on we get that line about pink snow i'll call it out when we get there but it kind of corresponds with theon's arc it reminds me of ramsay snow i don't know it's fun wordplay i think it's supposed to be intentional right and remind us of similar situations in this book i think it is like there's a lot of language and imagery in here that

primes you for the red wedding happening and i think that this is one of them so harma sucks whatever but rattleshirt and the weeper also kind of suck. He says that they would slit you as soon as they would spit on you, which was really annoying. That is gonna bug me. In the passage, it literally says they would slit you as soon as they would spit on you. And I get it, it's not supposed to rhyme, but it leads you to

think it's gonna rhyme, and then you get to the end of it, and it doesn't rhyme. And it just, it's really annoying. I don't get that relief. Thanks, George. Life is not a song chloe it should be eliana more like chaotic rhyme verse whatever so speaking of chaotic evil at the very least we got baromir six skins god he sucks he does suck uh he's a warg skin changer warg subclass with a big white bear as a steed and a shadow cat and he's got like three wolves that follow him everywhere yeah he thinks he's the shit i mean wouldn't you if i had all these aminals yeah i guess so that's true if i if i

rode on a polar bear i would think i was the. So there are places that are weirder than these people in the north, obviously. I mean, you have everything in the lands of always winter, but you have the frost fangs and you even have the ice clans who are said to ride chariots of walrus bones pulled by savage beasts. Or you have cave dwellers who dye their faces purple and green and even men who walk solely barefoot, the horned and their feet are basically leather at this point so another thing that stood out to me in all of this is like mance's knowledge of the old tongue it actually kind of reminded me of

danny's story actually because mance likely learned the old tongue after deserting when he joined the free folk though i guess it's possible that he learned it before, because that would actually be a super useful skill for being a part of the Night's Watch and for intel when you think about it. But anyway, he probably learned it later to better communicate with the Free Folk, just as Dany has to learn Dothraki. She already knew Valyrian from her time in the Free Cities, and because as a a targaryen it

was something that people wanted to make sure their children knew and also and also danny is likely the stallion who mounts the world or at least like drogon is one of these two all right something like that and part of this prophecy is that she would unite the Colossars into one enormous Colossar in the way that Mance unites the Free Folk tribes. And at the same time, that's the way that Jon ends up merging the Free Folk with the North, right?

He uses Stannis for that. And I love this bit about Mance singing in the Old Tongue because of this humanization of this pilgrimage moving south and their words mattering and their songs mattering still even as they die off these people have their own language and culture and they're being shoved out of their homes by the ice zombies so mance even representing a little bit of that culture is very nice to hear yeah he cares enough to like learn this thing and

go through the effort of it because he thinks it's important. And he uses it to speak with all of them and get on their level. And I just realized, reading this chapter, that the way that Jon describes how Mance unites the different tribes, I'm going to read this passage aloud because I think it's very important. Mance had spent years assembling this vast plotting host, talking to this clan mother and that magnar, winning one village with sweet words and another with a song, and a third with the edge of his sword, making peace between Harmadogshead and the Lord of Bones, between the Hornfoots and the Nightrunners, between the Walrusmen of the Frozen Shore and the Cannibal Clans of the Great Ice ice rivers hammering a hundred different

daggers into one great spear aimed at the heart of the seven kingdoms he had no crown nor scepter no robes of silk and velvet but it was plain to john that man's reader was a king and more than name and there's some fantastic language in here such as that hammering a hundred different daggers into one great spear, it's so reminiscent of what Aegon the Conqueror does with the Iron Throne. He was establishing and making himself a king. And so a lot of people think of Ned's example of ruling the north when Jon advises Stannis of go to the mountain clans and win them over, show them that you're their king, ask them, meet with them. But I don't think that Jon's necessarily thinking of Ned's

example here because what he's thinking of is, Stannis, you want to be a king? Here's how I've seen a king do it. So when he tells that, he's actually talking about how he's seen it from Mance because from the get-go in Mance's tent john sees the respect that mance pays the people that he wants to lead how he gets on their level and he meets with them and then he brings them all together because he cares and he's like stanis you gotta show him you care i would argue that he does learn that from ned as well though i mean ned uh he learned things about each of his men even the hill tribe say valiant ned's precious little girl uh ned still struck home so i would argue that john learned not only from ned but also from seeing it in mance and seeing the difference in the free folks

politics and he did learn that directly from mance but he did have that background with Ned to go off of, in my opinion. Yeah, I mean, it could be both, and they're both reflections of these same values in different ways. So he feels like he hasn't learned that much in the face of Corrin dying in Corrin's desertion. The wildlings don't do anything crazy, they're just marching. He barely even sees Mance. For 8,000 years, the men of House Stark had lived and died to protect their people against such ravagers. And reavers. In Bastardborn or no, the same blood ran in his veins.

Bran and Rickon are still at Winterfell besides. Maester Lewin, Ser Roderick, Old Nan, Farlin, the Kennelmaster, Miccon at his forge, engaged by his ovens, everyone I ever knew, everyone I ever loved. If Jon must slay a man he half admired and almost liked to save them from the mercies of Rattleshirt and Harma Dogshead and the earless Magnus then, that was what he meant to do. So it's just like in a Game of Thrones.

He is having these wildlings and these free folk humanize themselves all around him, right? They're coming to life. But at the same time, he's telling himself, my family needs me. I have to save them from the wildlings. But I feel like he's doing more than saving them from the wildlings in his mind. It's him proving himself to them that he's good enough to be a part of the Starks. He wants to protect them. But the why is the only thing that's absent on the page we know it's not really from the wildlings they wouldn't really come close to being successful at raiding winterfell

even if they made it past the wall there's that huge shadow that's just poured across the book during john's arc right now the wildlings have no discipline. When we get to the battle at the wall, their number shatters eventually, and you see why, no discipline. But John's doing quite a bit of back and forth with himself as well through the chapter, and he's relying on that black cloak right beneath his saddle. Yes, he is. And regarding those wildlings, Jon thinks that the Night's Watch are out here beyond the wall. All they really need to do is kill one man. They don't need to kill several of them. They just need to kill Mance in order to break apart this entire host, which I think is an interesting

parallel. Like, I don't know that it's going to be exactly the same as in the show, right, where you just kill the one necromancer and everything else falls. But it kind of speaks to that idea. And of course, like, as you were talking about regarding Jon's desire to protect Bran and Rickon and the folks over in Winterfell, and it being his desire to prove himself, there's also, of course, he wants to prove himself because he loves them too. He loves his family and it kind of speaks to how later on Jon's going to be torn between his two great loves. Like here it's because he's starting to feel that connection to the Wildlings, but later on it's going to be between his Stark family and Daenerys, who on one hand he loves and on the other hand is a key to his other family.

And while the why that you were talking about here, like that why being absent on the page, is kind of vague here, later on it might be a little more clear in that why as it clashes against one another is going to be much stronger.

Yeah. So he prays to his father's gods as the host moves along slowly i really like this line uh as they move most of the column was out of the foothills now oozing along the west bank of the milk water like honey on a cold winter's morning following the course of the river into the heart of the haunted forest and interestingly enough i did notice that a lot of the mentions of honey in john's chapters there's only like 15 of them but over half of them have to do with either the north symbolism and personification of the north flowing like honey and val's hair huh Huh. Isn't that interesting?

That is interesting. There's, um, it's interesting because as you talk about it being with the North and here pairing it with the milk water in Exodus, the promised land within Jewish tradition is described as the land of milk and honey. So I think that's kind of interesting, right? Especially

if it like... I think George is definitely playing on that. He has to be. Like he said, the promised land, milk and honey. Val's hair being described as like this honey color and honey creeping throughout the snow and all this. It's

gotta be something intentional. That's an awesome catch. As they move john thinks about his sworn brothers all 300 of them mounted and waiting ahead in the fist of the first men ready to attack he thinks that thorin smallwood and jarman buckwell had to have come back ranging by now with news of mance's host to mormont and that mormont would not run but face it head on so he's preparing himself for that then there's this line one day soon he would hear the sound of war horns and see a column of riders pounding down on them with black cloaks flapping and cold steel in their hands and he is gonna see that but that's direct stannis foreshadowing for later on in this

book right but him seeing his brothers in his mind with their cloaks flapping black in the wind is a really nice thought otherwise uh he's come to see them almost as a family but this is a different sort of family that he's trying to assimilate into and it's starting to feel like he could possibly assimilate into them even if it's just for a little bit it's so hard for john he keeps trying to find a family and finds all these different ones and he's like i don't fit are you my mother oh doros no are you my mother the free folk leaders each hold a part of the army although they are undisciplined at best harma held a third of the army and all of the giants the oryx and the fire flingers

and then mance takes the center with another third guarding the remains of their last summer harvest damn that's so scary all right and smaller bands of outriders follow Rattleshirt, Jarl, Jarl? Jarl? Tormund, and the Weeper, keeping order. Jarlsberg? The cheese? The cheeseling? Oh, is he part of the last summer harvest? Only one in a hundred wildlings are mounted, and Jon thinks Mormon's gonna axe

through them super easily, and that Mance had best blunt the force in the center, and like, if Mance fell, the wall would be safe actually for another hundred years. The wall was not safe for another hundred years, subtext. Like another hundred, I don't know, hours. Yeah. John thumbs the pommel of his sword, the wolf pommel, and the snow falls heavily down.

Ghost makes off to hunt, he always returns at nightfall to camp and as john catches up with tormund and company they all start to joke about him and the mammoths and the giants which he's seeing for the first time and that leads egret to sing a half-assed rendition of the last of the giants do you know the last of the giants without waiting for an answer egret said you need a deeper voice than mine to do it proper then she's saying oh i am the last of the giants without waiting for an answer egret said you need a deeper voice than mine to do it proper then she sang oh i am the last of the giants my people are gone from the earth torment giant spain heard the words and grinned the last of the great mountain giants who ruled all the world at my birth he bellowed back through the snow long spear rike joined in singing

oh the small folk have stolen my forest They've stolen my rivers and hills And they've built a grave All through my valleys And fished all the fish from my rills Egret and Tormund sang back at him in turn In suitably gigantic voices Tormund's sons

Toreg and Dormund Added their deep voices as well, then his daughter Munda and all the rest. Others began to bang their spears on leather and shields to keep rough time until the whole war band was singing as they rode. In stone halls they burn their great fires, in stone halls they forge their sharp spears. Whilst I walk alone in the mountains with no true companion but tears. They hunt me with dogs in the daylight, they hunt me with torches by night. For these men who are small can never stand tall, whilst giants still walk in the light. Oh, I am the last of the giants,

so learn well the words of my song. For when I am gone, the singing will fade and the silence shall last long and long. There were tears on Ygritte's cheeks when the song ended. Why are you weeping? Jon asked. It was only a song. There are hundreds of giants. I've just seen them. Oh, hundreds, she said furiously.

You know nothing, Jon Snow. You, Jon! First off, spew. S-P-E-W hermione granger understands uh second off the song is pretty meta right like the whole refugee arc like there's not much to really explain you guys have seen it and there's even more on a personal level for john it kind of speaks for itself for all of that. So as you can tell by the way that Chloe and I read this passage, fun fact, Michael aka Bookshelf Stud

on Reddit, he was here and joined us for a Theon episode long ago, has pointed out to me that you can in fact sing the song The Last of the Giants to the tune of the Mexican Hat Dance. So that's why that happened. Also, the tune of the mexican hat dance so that's why that happened also the theme of the last of the giants and being alone throwing this out there it's the boulevard of broken dreams

of a song of ice and fire but lastly also in a way being the last of the giants it's kind of about both john and danny's storylines too as danny thinks of herself as the last of the dragons finds out she isn't and then later on i guess john's the last of the dragons yep yep so absolutely major subtext that they really want us to grab from this absolutely it's got thematic resonance all over oh my god so you may have noticed eliana as egret interrupted herself and yelled john at the end because egret interrupts john a bird attacks him a fucking burb or else burb rakes him across the face with its talons and egret tries to protect him with a dagger a bone uh a bone hilt dagger is this so speaking of red wedding things bird freaking across face

things reeking across faces in general that could be something that could totally be something maybe maybe maybe it's nothing but maybe it's something echoing imagery at the very least a motif if you will at least and i mean let's face it this is literally the whole book you're seeing a lot of the same stuff you're seeing crows feasting on things wow i mean it's war people are dead at the very end of the book everything is in ruins a storm of swords so rattleshirt comes to take john to mance and rattleshirt's pissed and everyone's like oh the eagle attacks john and then rattleshirt comes so it was obviously planned and rattleshirt is treating him like a traitor out of nowhere and egret and torment are like defending him but rattleshirt decides he's going to take him to manse can a bird hate john had slain the wildling oral but

some part of the man remained within the eagle interestingly enough that line reminds me of blood raven right that that whole idea can a bird hate and blood raven of course has the sister he loved the brother he hated the brother he lost the burp he hated the burp he loved yeah and blood raven inside a bird yeah dude blood raven can hate i think we've learned that that's true you're right that's a really good connection i didn't understand this one line um until you spelled it out for me i get it john then hurries to his horse and he prepares for a battle of wits with mance it's really crazy because he like he runs out to get to his horse and it doesn't explain why just that

like he hurries to mount his horse before he meets mance and at first i was all like is this like pride because you want to be mounted and you want to seem like the bigger man you don't want to be like on your feet and feel low but then i was like oh he doesn't want them to discover his black cloak beneath his saddle. That's why he hurries to the horse. I think that's a really good catch, and I think that's why Jon does it. Now that you've said that aloud, it has sparked for me the thought that Jon then is a mirror for Mance. Mance didn't want to give up his other cloak,

which is why he deserted, and Jon doesn't want to give up his other cloak, which is why he deserted. And Jon doesn't want to give up his other cloak either. That's the thought. Very interesting. No, it's true. Ygritte tries to ride on with them and Rattleshirt doesn't really want her to. She still stays on. And the snow falls deeper and deeper. Night keeps descending on them.

It's closer and closer. And the F fist of the first men emerges but where john thought his brothers may have you know been waiting it's silent there's no noise uh he wonders if his brothers have already made their stand and slaughtered and run but as they reach the bottom of the slope the southern slope the ground is covered in entrails and the first thing i'm sorry eliana don't listen to any of this just log off while you can the first thing that john thinks is wolves eat their prey and he realizes the the horses are dead they're scattered their body parts are everywhere it was not a wolf that attacked them so the wildlings strip the horses of useful things like

steel leather horseshoes and rattleshirt points john to join mance at the top of the slope and john looks around at the horrible destruction and thinks he had never seen pink snow before which reminds me of ramsay snow that's another red wedding-esque a storm of swords bolton-esque connection that i kind of noticed yeah i definitely that's like the thought that came to my mind as well i've never thought of it before like immediately i looked at it and i was like that's about ramsay yeah i don't know like how strong it is but it is interesting interesting with the way that Clash ended. Definitely feels important in that way.

A little bit. Very much so connected, even if we don't see him directly here. Yeah, it's kind of like a reminder, right? Because we don't see that storyline in A Storm of Swords, but it's like, hey, this is in the background everyone, remember? Well, interestingly enough, he then passes some of Chet's dead dogs.

So that reminds me of, of course, the dogs at Winterfell and Ramsay and his hounds. And he thinks about Sam. He wonders if Sam made it out safe from whatever happened here. God, sorry. That Sam chapter is like... So good. Not even like looking, like high key, one of my favorite chapters. It's so good not even like looking like high key one of my favorite chapters it's maybe my favorite chapter in the in the entire series it's like the reluctant hero

like it's the unexpected hero you don't expect sam to do it but then he does it and you're like oh shit there's all of that it's like the way it opens to and the constant repetition of the sobbings sam took another step it's so well done god i can't wait till we get there but for now we're stuck on shot two it's a good chapter no it's so good it's so good uh it's not sam one but yeah yeah so mance harma jarl steer and varamir six skins all wait ahead in the remaining tents from the slaughter and mance is wearing this helm that i just want to call out it's fucking ridiculous it's a great bronze and iron helm with raven wings at either temple what the fuck whose whose home do you think

this used to be i was thinking that like i don't know it could have been a Malister, but it's a Raven Wings, not Eagle Wings. So and how does okay, I think that's a great point. Because now I'm like, how does John know the difference between a Raven Wing and an Eagle Wing on a helm? Like, how? It could have been a Blackwood or a Corbray or a Doggett or a Horse. I mean, yeah, I i think all these are possible i think it's a perfectly apt helm for mance too though it's something i should put some thought into i might uh theorize it later huh yeah and it does encompass him well being a crow and then

leaving from that becoming a raven bigger Bigger. A bigger birb. Mance asks John, Bro, what happened to your eye? But he's actually really mad. And then Igor tells Mance what happened. And then to his chagrin because once more, guys, he's trying to figure out John's lies. Yeah, Mance is totally not

having it and John's like, oh fuck, you got me. You got me you got me jean barbershop okay would you like to keep your eye john asked the king beyond the wall if so tell me how many they were and try and speak the truth this time bastard of winterfell i love the emphasis here this time mance uses the word to try to hurt him and he may see through john's lies but john is just like ned holding it close to his heart john knows he still has a chance because mance thinks being called a bastard would hurt him because the story that john told him right of being the master of Winterfell but much like Lord Snow at Castle Black no longer hurt him, Jon has turned these words

into just words like Tyrion told him to do. So he's able to see through it and he knows that he can still play a few moves in this game. I didn't understand what you were pointing out there but now I. Yeah, that's actually... I didn't understand what you were pointing out

there, but now I see it and that's totally true. That's where Vance gets the idea from. I get it now. Calling him Bastard of Winterfell. Why would that matter? He's been the Bastard of Winterfell his whole life. Yeah, but yeah, it's because, as you said, he still believes a little bit of what Jon tells him. And this

time, you know, Jon tells him actually the truth. For realsies. He's like, we were once 300, but I guess not anymore. Harma had found over a hundred horses, with more dead, and buried beneath snow in the east.

And the man demands that Jon tell him who held the command. And Jon's like, wait, so you haven't found the body yet yeah man's is like don't fuck with me just tell me the truth kid i'm not here to play good cop bad cop it's bad cop and worse cop just tell it to me or i'm going to give you a fucking rattle shirt. We are not doing this. We're not playing fucking games, John. Yeah. John struggles with giving Nance the truth, but he finally remembers

what Corrin said, that you must not balk. Bark. And he tells them, the old bear commanded here in Bowen Marsh commands at Castle Black. His frown cracked the blood on his cheek. This is too hard, John thought in despair. How do I play the turncloak without becoming one?

Corrin had not told him that, but the second step is always easier than the first. I wanted us to read this line just because it's so good, because this is John's one of many, so many vows that make you swear and swear moments. And it's such a great question. How much does one pretend until they are no longer pretending? Like, where is the line between when your actions are the same as being true to what you're pretending to be because they have the same consequence? And so I think there's this incredible irony here in the scene

because John is wrestling with himself and that feeling that he is a treasonous turncloak because like on a reread, we see that Jon feels way more loyalty to the Night's Watch than some of the other survivors of the attack on the Fist of the First Men who are later going to mutiny at Crassers. So again, there's that question, where's the line between the turncloak, playing the turncloak, and being one? Yeah, when do you cross over? When is it too far gone? When can you

not come back? He tells them that the old bear was ready for, and he trails off, but Mance finishes it himself, and he answers, for me, for myself, for mance raider for me bitch had i been fool enough to storm this hill i might have lost five men for every crow i slew and still counted myself lucky his mouth grew hard but when the dead walk

walls and stakes and swords mean nothing you You cannot fight the dead, Jon Snow. No man knows that half so well as me. He gazed up at the darkening sky and said, The crows may have helped us more than they know. I'd wondered why we'd suffered no attacks. But there's still a hundred leagues to go, and the cold is rising. Faramir, send your wolves sniffing after the wights. I won't have them taking us unawares.

My lord of bones, double all the patrols and make certain every man has torch and flint. Stir, Jarl, you ride at first light. I love that he had a plan. I thought that was interesting because he's the only quote-unquote king that's had a plan against the others up until, you know, Stannis and Jon, their little mini reign. Oh, yeah. Get the patrols, do this, do that, you man this.

I mean, he has it under control-ish. Ish. He's doing the best he can and he's doing pretty all right, all things considered, you know. Yeah, like he says, you can't fight death. But Jon can and he will, many all right all things considered you know yeah like he says you can't fight death but john can and he will many ways honestly truly so rattle shirt is all come on give me his bones fuck this guy but egret argues she's like he was just trying to save his brothers and he saved me from dying too you know and john looks man straight in the eyes and says, I wear your cloak that you gave me. And then Ygritte lays down this big ol' lie and goes, a sheepskin cloak, said Ygritte. And there's many a night we dance between it, too.

The things we do for love, Ygritte. Yeah. And also, I forgot this earlier, like, and didn't catch it when John's cloak was described, but it is a sheepskin cloak, and therefore John is... Ah! Oh! Don't say it! He's a wolf in sheep's clothing. Ah!

George is a... He is, though. But, like, this is intentional. I refuse to believe this is not intentional. Turn, John john and die yeah i mean this is like a saying like that's what it is and he's going to lead to his actions are very much going to lead to the defeat of the free folk just barely yeah with egret's life on the line john has to lie and we get that great line that robert says to ned stark in a game of thrones you could never lie for love nor honor ned stark and it reminds me very much of john

and then there's this little just this little quote back and forth between him and egret and he thinks it was easy to lose your way beyond the wall. Jon did not know that he could tell honor from shame anymore, or right from wrong. Father, forgive me. Yes, he said. Father, forgive me. Oh. Dad, no. Netsark died for our sins.

Quick thought about this moment just as in john's last chapter torment is actually somehow playing that role as the key to truth that saves john's ass once more but like in a slightly different way because last time it was torment naming craster as john's source for information and that prevented mance from knowing john's true loyalty and this time time, Jon's actually very lucky for Tormund's absence because that means that there's no one to counter Jon's loyalty slash his and Ygritte's claim that they lie together every night. Because we've just seen that conversation. That they do not.

They do not. So Mance would never part lovers, he says, and he sends Jon and Ygritte along with Styr and Jarl to climb the wall on a special project using special resources allocated just for this. And Jon confronts Ygritte about her honorable lies. I think that the language that Mance uses here regarding how he wouldn't part lovers is interesting.

What he says is he could not part two hearts that beat as one, which turns out is actually the title of a song that's played at several weddings throughout A Song of Ice and Fire. And of course, here in this moment, John is wearing a different cloak, as pointed out by Ygritte. Yeah, and later she starts to sleep in that said cloak of protection. Mm-hmm. And so, like, interestingly, like, you know, right here, right? Yeah, and later she starts to sleep in that said cloak of protection. the peach by thomas seven strings i don't know what that part means but like it's also played at liza and peter's wedding and it's even played at the wedding tourney at white halls which turns out was actually a blackfire cover-up it's interesting right because we know that ramsay's wedding to aria is a farce lies and peters is too so is the one at white walls and so

so first i want to point out out that it's very apt of man to slip this kind of language of songs that he loves so much into this exchange. It adds to his character and how he sees the world. He's stern, but he's an idealist. He has this big dream of uniting and saving the people beyond the wall, and this is adding on to that characterization. But also,

coming back to that wedding and the ones that are played, right? Is this song perhaps another kind of Lies in Arbor gold thing? I think you might be onto something here, because it's only being played during these fake weddings and fake events. Fake romances. Yes. Also, side note, White Walls.

Yes, Blackfire, obviously Rebellion and Blackfire cover-up. Also, totally foreshadowing, or not foreshadowing, backshadowing, hindsight shadowing of the tourney at Harrenhal. Oh, absolutely. It's another one of those, like, echoes. Cool. Okay. I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page. Yeah, I really,

really agree that the two hearts that beat as one has to be kind of like a Lies in Arbor gold situation. It definitely is signifying something fake is going on behind the scenes. I love that. Yeah, it's a weird song. We don't know the lyrics. We don't. What strange song can we

graft, like what tune can we graft onto it? Who knows? Who knows, seeing as last week, the week before we had Seasons of Love, last week we had Dornishman's Wife, and this week we have Two Hearts That Beat as One. Interesting. And The Last of the Giants.

Yes, and The Last of the Giants. So Jon truly is the song of Ice and Fire. Got a whole bunch of, got enough for an EP right now. Did you get it? He is. He's the EP of Ice and Fire. Aw. Ghost padded beside their garons as John and Ygritte descended the fist.

It was not until they were halfway across the milk water that John felt safe enough to say, I never asked you to lie for me. I never did, she said. I left out part is all. You said. That we fuck beneath your cloak many a night. That was very forward, El eliana i never said when we started though the smile she gave him was almost shy find another place for ghosts to

sleep tonight john snow it's like man said deeds is truer than words pull your dick out boy take a cold shower john snow if you had taken a cold shower earlier oh my god keep your dick out don't take a cold shower uh so in all seriousness whip it out john snow in all seriousness a really blunt comparison just like bottom ground that i guess we could give to egret that i've kind of strayed from doesn't work perfectly in status for the characters, but something interesting every step of the way, Ygritte has defended Jod Snow, right? She's lied for him.

She said, no, no, he's a good guy. We got to keep him. He's good. He killed Corrin. He protected me. Reminds me a lot of somebody else that has a very ferocious personality they shoved him down every time he tried to rise and kicked him when he curled up on the ground but then they heard a roar that's my father's man you're kicking howled the she-wolf are you telling me that liana and helen

were a thing is that what you're saying, Chloe? Liana and Helen I literally don't have the energy for your bullshit. No, Eliana. What I'm telling you is that Liana and Ygritte have some very minor rough parallels. You pair this with Bail the Bard's story, and later on in A Storm of Swords,

Jon gets those thoughts. You were wrong to love her you were wrong to leave her egret has some really subtle liana vibes some of those parallels between liana egret john and rhaegar might also give us more insight to what sort of lies rhaegar and liana may or may not have told and whether they led to true love or not. Those lies at least were meant to protect each other or protect Jon, or even protect the kingdom and realm. I mean, look, maybe the White Walkers learned to make boats, you know? Like, that's our biggest fear.

If they make boats, I mean- It's over for us. It's over. It's over. They're going to E.T., they're going everywhere. So maybe Rhaegar was an asshole fool who believed in prophecy, and Lyanna was young, naive and escaping the prison of marriage to a guy who doesn't get a girl to orgasm before he blows his load. Also marital rape. Anyways, I digress. We don't know. We don't know. But there's a lot to frame for both relationships and they obviously vibe really hard with each other and we see a lot of that next week in the cave with vanessa of the knights cast we'll be talking about that with how john and egret never want to leave that cave and i'm sure

rhaegar and lyanna probably didn't want to leave the tower and eventually we'll get into betrayal betrayal yes betrayal and we'll talk a lot then about some of these parallels as well and the ideas and thoughts that haunt john yes and of course as with john and egret you're saying rager and liana all of those what's the truth what's not what's the truth hanging over both of them two hearts a beat as one anyway um yes i'm very excited to get into this and dig deeper into these relationships next week yes i can't wait i'm so excited to have vanessa on this chapter is thick like we said two c's i'm like wow we just digested this i need a drink i need a break you need a cold shower oh my. And someone warm next to you.

Later. Ew. Ew. You guys, thanks for listening this week. We're really excited to have Vanessa Cole from Night's Cast on next week. Again, check her out on Twitter. Her Twitter account is BKColeArtist And you can check out the Night's Cast at

The Night's Cast. And if you are done checking them out, make sure you flash over to our Twitter as well, where sometimes we tweet good things. We just retweeted a really cool collage of pictures of me and Eliana living our best lives. So follow us, Girls Gone Canon on Twitter at Girls Gone Canon. And hey, if you enjoyed this week's episode or you want to chat about it or chat about anything else, feel free to send us an email at girlsgonecanon at gmail.com. We love hearing from you.

And of course, if you want to catch our next few episodes or anything else, be sure to subscribe to us. You can find us on iTunes, on Google Play, on Podbean, on Spotify, on Acast, on Podbean, on Spotify, on Acast, and on Stitcher. And if you've got a few bucks

burning a hole in your wallet, check out our Patreon at patreon.com slash girlsgonecanon. Our tiers start at $1 and up. $5 and up patrons do get access to a special Patreon-only episode. $5 and up patrons only. You to a special Patreon only episode.

$5 and up patrons only. You guys will get this month a episode on Northern Independence which I'm very excited about but feel free to check out a lot of our past episodes including the Winds of Winter sample chapters and a very extensive Dance of the Dragons series.

And of course we are starting a new series at the end of July. Another reread series free to the public. It'll be the His Dark Materials series. We'll be starting with Northern Lights, aka the Golden Compass, depending on where you live. It should be good.

I'm very excited. And as always, you guys, I am Chloe, one of your hosts. You know where to find me on the internet. And I am Eliana, another one of your hosts. Never find me on the internet.

Oh my god, goodbye. You guys are our favorites. I don't know what to do with you, though. Goodbye, everyone.