Episode 103: A CLASH OF KINGS, SANSA III: "The Mad King" SHOW NOTES! (Patreon)

Hello and welcome to the Not A Cast … podcast: the one true chapter-by-chapter podcast going through A Song of Ice and Fire one chapter a week. I’m one of your hosts Jeff better known as BryndenBFish. 

And I’m your other host Emmett, better known as PoorQuentyn.          

Welcome to the one hundred and third episode of the Not A Cast, titled: “The Mad King: An Analysis of ACOK, Sansa III,” in which Robb Stark wins a glorious victory...and that’s it. Nothing else happens. What a feel-good chapter, right Emmett?

Keep reading, Jeff. 

Sigh. Ok. In which Robb wins a glorious victory, and Joffrey responds by having Sansa beaten in public. Ugh, you know things are bad when Tyrion has to play the hero. 

This episode is brought to you by our Small Council: 

• Hand of the King WolfmanZack 
• Grand Maester Timbob
• Lord Commander of the Kingsguard Mark N. 
• Lord Travis, Master of Ships and Warden of the Waves
• Ser Keith J, Master of Whisperers
• Lord Philip the Merciful, Master of Laws
• Archmaester June, Healer of the Lesser Poxes
• Ragged Michael, Warden of the North
• Nelson the Hammer, Prince of Dragonstone
• Scarlett the Other Red Woman and Mistress of Whisperers
• Lord Micah: Warden of the West and the Kraken’s Bane
• Lord James: the Jim that was Promised
• The High Bearded Priest
• Lord Jake, Assistant (to the) Hand of the King
• Lady Xena Valyrian
• Hedrigal, Captain of the Air Ship Arrogance
• His Grace’s High Inquisitor Frank
• Ser Jasper the Cruel, the King’s Justice
• Laurence, Prince of Dorne
• Kelly, Warden of the East and Mistress of (Old) Bay of Crabs
• Steven the Steadfast, Master of Hounds
• The Blue Winter Rose Knight of Highgarden
• Lady Stephanie
• Lord Anonymous
• Lord Carlos
• Lord Andrew the Restless, a Priest of the Drowned God
• The King's Cook, Nolly (No-lee) Olly (Oh-lee), Master of Cannoli
• Ser Sourcedelica 
• Prince Matthew of House Targaryen - Proud Soy Boy of Summerhall, Defender of the 5th Book and Swing Dancer with Dragons
• Ser K.W. Dent, Elsie of the Blackwood Guard, and Batman of the Seven Kingdoms
• Lord Penchant for Nostalgia
• Queer Alex, Rainbow Commander of the They-des and Gentle-thems (ladies and gentlemen)
• Lord Clint, Esq., Master of Absolutely, Positively NOT Serving As A Spy for Several Unnamed High Lords and Ladies In Order to Further the Secret Blackfyre-Style Conspiracy to Overthrow The Oppressive Small Council
• Haldivar, The Waiter for TWOW
• A-a-ron Damphair Prophet of the Forsaken and High Priest of Euron Crows Eye
• Lieutenant Glenn Lord of H town
• Vanerys of the House Colgaryen, the First of Her Name, Princess of Dragonstone, Mistress of Art, The Overworked, Queen of the Pencils, the Eraser and the First Draft, Queen of Monochrome, Devotee of the Great GOT, Portraitist of the Realm, Lady Realist of the Seven Kingdoms, Blender of Paints and Maker of Drawings
• Seanwell the Slayer
• Lord Adam T
• Lady Alexandra of Tarth
• Ser Kristoph Logas, Bloody Scorpion of the Red Field, Defender of the Letter of Kin, and the Wolverine of house Qorgyle
• And our newest member of the small council: Lady Elizabeth, Mistress of Horse (Faced Lesbians)
• Thank you to all our counselors!

Spoiler warning: All published books, 5 novels, 3 Dunk and Egg novellas, histories, interviews, TWOW sample chapters, as well as Game of Thrones the TV show. Anything and everything!

Question

Ser Josh Snow, a Sworn Sword patron, asks:

Hello again Stannis Bros,

My question relates to the small nuances GRRM likes to include that potentially link to other parts of the story. Some of my favorites are bran meets the 3ECrow in one of his first dreams, and he asks for corn...kind of like another bird we know who is totally not bloodraven. Or when Arya begins to consistently utter valar morghulis, without knowing it’s meaning, and before it becomes her livelihood. Do you have any favorite small hints or nuances?

So, thank you Ser Josh Snow for the question. If you’d like to ask us questions that we’ll answer here on the NotACast podcast, you are welcome to become a Sworn Sword patron at patreon.com/NotACastASOIAF where you can also get 25 bonus episodes ASOIAF episodes, 6 Fevre Dream episodes, show notes, access to our exclusive slack and more! And as we’ve talked about in our March patreon update and wasnted to revisit here, we are getting VERY CLOSE to our next stretch goal of attaining 900 total patrons! When we hit that goal, we’ll do a full-out, multi-part, analysis of The Forsaken! If that or the other patreon benefits interest you, consider heading on over to patreon.com/NotACastASOIAF to join our patreon for as little as $1/month. 

As of this recording, we’ve only got 42 of patrons to go before we hit our goal! (It was 59 last month!) But enough about patreon for now. Let’s turn our attention to Sansa Stark. When we last checked in with Sansa, she had met Dontos Hollard and had hope for the first time that she could escape King’s Landing and Joffrey. Let’s see what happens to Sansa in this analysis of ACOK, Sansa III!

Synopsis

Oh good lord. It’s this chapter. Jesus. Here we go. And no, it’s not because it’s a Sansa chapter, you guys. I’ve reformed my ways.

Sandor Clegane warns Sansa Stark that she needs to hustle her ass up, or it’s going to go real fucking bad for Sansa. And Sansa dutifully tries to hurry, but her fingers fumble at her buttons and knots on her dress. 

The Hound was always rough-tongued, but something in the way he had looked at her filled her with dread. Had Joffrey found out about her meetings with Ser Dontos? Please no, she thought as she brushed out her hair. Ser Dontos was her only hope. I have to look pretty, Joff likes me to look pretty, he's always liked me in this gown, this color.

Sansa finishes up and makes her way to the side of Sandor Clegane -- the side that wasn’t burned. She asks what she did, but it’s not her that’s raised Joffrey’s ire. It’s Robb. Sansa quickly states that Robb is a traitor, and that had nothing to do with whatever treasons Robb had committed. She knows that if Robb hurt Jaime, she would face Ser Ilyn.

The Hound mocks Sansa for being so well trained as he directs her to the lower bailey. She passes through a large group of people gathered. Everyone either glares at her or avoids her gaze. And then Sansa sees a yellow cat dying from a crossbow bolt through the ribs. Ser Dontos Hollard approaches on his stick horse and whispers at Sansa to be brave. 

Joffrey stands in the center of everyone, winding up his crossbow again with Ser Boros and Ser Meryn next to him. Sansa falls to her knees, but Joff states that kneeling won’t save her. She’s to answer for her brother’s crimes. He then orders her to stand. Sansa pleads that she played no part in whatever Robb did, but Joffrey only yells for someone to get Sansa to her feet. 

The Hound pulled her to her feet, not ungently.

"Ser Lancel," Joff said, "tell her of this outrage."

Sansa had always thought Lancel Lannister comely and well spoken, but there was neither pity nor kindness in the look he gave her. "Using some vile sorcery, your brother fell upon Ser Stafford Lannister with an army of wargs, not three days ride from Lannisport. Thousands of good men were butchered as they slept, without the chance to lift sword. After the slaughter, the northmen feasted on the flesh of the slain."

Horror catches in her throat at the same time that Joffrey sneers about her inability to say anything. Ser Dontos tries to intervene, but Joffrey tells him to stfu. The “king” points the crossbow at Sansa’s face and declares that the Starks are all unnatural, just like their direwolves, like the one who savaged Joffrey back in AGOT, Sansa I.

"That was Arya's wolf," she said. "Lady never hurt you, but you killed her anyway."

"No, your father did," Joff said, "but I killed your father. I wish I'd done it myself. I killed a man last night who was bigger than your father. They came to the gate shouting my name and calling for bread like I was some baker, but I taught them better. I shot the loudest one right through the throat."

Man of the people, everyone. Good king, Joffrey. 

Facing the crossbow quarrel, Sansa asks if the man died, and Joffrey brags that yeah, he died. Crossbow bolt went right through his throat. So fuckin’ awesome. And he shot a woman too, but his quarrel only hit her in the arm. But then Joff lowers the crossbow. He can’t kill Sansa. His mom said they’d kill Jaime if he killed Sansa. So lame. But she’s going to be punished anyways as a warning for what will happen if Robb doesn’t yield. Brave King Joffrey, everyone.

Joffrey orders Sandor to hit her, but then Ser Dontos pushes forward, asking if he can do the deed. Sansa realizes what Dontos is doing: trying to spare her from a real beating. And she prays that Joffrey will laugh and “be satisfied” as Dontos hits her over the head with his melon. But Joffrey doesn’t even smile.

"Boros. Meryn."

Ser Meryn Trant seized Dontos by the arm and flung him brusquely away. The red-faced fool went sprawling, broomstick, melon, and all. Ser Boros seized Sansa.

"Leave her face," Joffrey commanded. "I like her pretty."

Good lord. Just … fuck this kid.

Boros punches Sansa in the stomach, and then grabs her hair when she falls to the floor. He draws his sword, and Sansa thinks for a moment that he’s going to slit her throat. Instead, he slaps her thighs with the flat side of his sword. Sansa screams in pain and cries. She tries to reassure herself that this torture will be over soon as she loses count of the times that Boros hits her with his sword.

"Enough," she heard the Hound rasp.

"No it isn't," the king replied. "Boros, make her naked."

Boros reaches a hand down Sansa’s bodice and rips hard like a fucking monster, and Sansa’s breasts are exposed to the whole of the court. She covers her breasts as people laugh at her. Joffrey orders that Sansa gets beaten bloody. Joffrey is going to make her suffer to teach Robb a- 

"What is the meaning of this?"

The Imp's voice cracked like a whip, and suddenly Sansa was free. She stumbled to her knees, arms crossed over her chest, her breath ragged. "Is this your notion of chivalry, Ser Boros?" Tyrion Lannister demanded angrily. His pet sellsword stood with him, and one of his wildlings, the one with the burned eye. "What sort of knight beats helpless maids?"

"The sort who serves his king, Imp." Ser Boros raised his sword, and Ser Meryn stepped up beside him, his blade scraping clear of its scabbard.

"Careful with those," warned the dwarf's sellsword. "You don't want to get blood all over those pretty white cloaks."

I mean, I’ve read and re-read this chapter and watched and re-watched this scene from Season 2, and even as I write this, I’m still breathing a sigh of relief here. Man.

Tyrion orders that someone give Sansa something to cover herself, and Sandor Clegane immediately jumps in to cover her with his white cloak (imagine that). The fabric feels rough against her skin, but Sansa thinks that “no velvet ever felt so fine.”

Outraged, Tyrion tells Joffrey that Sansa is going to be her queen. What the fuck are you doing, you asshole? Well, Joffrey is punishing Sansa. And her crime? Uh, she’s a Stark? Yeah, and you’re a goddamn goose, Joffrey. 

"You can't talk to me that way. The king can do as he likes."

"Aerys Targaryen did as he liked. Has your mother ever told you what happened to him?"

Ser Boros Blount harrumphed. "No man threatens His Grace in the presence of the Kingsguard."

Tyrion Lannister raised an eyebrow. "I am not threatening the king, ser, I am educating my nephew. Bronn, Timett, the next time Ser Boros opens his mouth, kill him." The dwarf smiled. "Now that was a threat, ser. See the difference?"

Boros, who BTW sucks so bad as a KG knight that he becomes Tommen’s poison-catcher in ADWD, threatens to tell Cersei like a fucking brat, and Tyrion’s like, yeah, do it. In fact, bring Cersei here. When Joffrey goes crimson at this, Tyrion mocks him and then tells him to use his ears, not his asshole-shaped mouth -- or else, his reign is gonna be real fuckin’ short.

When Joffrey starts to sputter about fear being better than love, Tyrion, again, mocks Joffrey and tells him it’s a pity Stannis and Renly aren’t twelve year old girls. Tyrion then orders Bronn and Timett to bring Sansa to her. She thinks they’ll escort her to her chambers, but instead, they take her to the Tower of the Hand. The PTSD kicks in as Sansa is led into the tower she had last stepped in when her father “fell from grace.” 

Servant girls change her clothes, “mouthing meaningless comforts” -- which, I just love. As the servants bathe and clothe Sansa, she thinks that only Ser Dontos tried to help her, and he wasn’t even a knight. Tyrion and Sandor weren’t knights either.  

The Hound hated knights . . . I hate them too, Sansa thought. They are no true knights, not one of them.

Sansa ain’t wrong.

After her bathing and clothing, Maester Frenken comes to Sansa and applies a salve on the welts that Boros Blount left on her legs. And then he mixes her some dreamwine and encourages her to sleep. Sansa wakes in the dark, pain ripping through her legs as she rises. She slips into a robe and starts moving out of her room. When the guards ask her where she’s going, she states that she’s off for the godswood. But no. The guards tell Sansa she’s to stay in her room. So, Sansa retreats.

As she sits in the room, she realizes that the room feels familiar, because this was the room where Arya stayed back in the day. And even if all Arya’s things had been moved out, the room felt the same. Food gets brought to Sansa, but she waves it off. The servant places the food and drink down on the table. As the servant departs, Sansa realizes that she’s thirsty though. So, she creeps over to the table, every step sending agonizing shots of pain through her legs. Sansa reaches the table, drinks two cups of water and nibbles an olive, and then there’s a knock on the door.

Into the room walks Tyrion Lannister, and Sansa immediately asks whether she’s his prisoner. Well, no. She’s a guest. And Tyrion wants to talk. Sansa agrees, noticing Tyrion’s ugly face. Tyrion asks if the room and board is up to her standards, and Sansa says sure. She thanks Tyrion for helping her with that whole business with Joffrey. 

"You have a right to know why Joffrey was so wroth. Six nights gone, your brother fell upon my uncle Stafford, encamped with his host at a village called Oxcross not three days ride from Casterly Rock. Your northerners won a crushing victory. We received word only this morning."

Robb will kill you all, she thought, exulting. "It's . . . terrible, my lord. My brother is a vile traitor."

Tyrion smiles at that, stating that Robb isn’t a fawn in all this war and shit. When Sansa asks about an army of wargs, Tyrion rolls his eyes and talks about Lancel being an idiot. Most likely, it was only Robb’s direwolf that was there during the battle. Speaking of Grey Wind, Robb sent the wolf forward against Stafford Lannister’s army while his northmen sneaked into his encampment and cut the horse lines. Those horses then trampled knights. Stafford was cut down by Lord Rickard Karstark as he ran after his own horse. The army melted away in a confusion of fleeing and dead Lannister men. Hundreds were taken captive. The survivors claimed that the old gods were marching with Robb.

Sansa asks if there was any sorcery involved, and Tyrion says nah, no sorcery. Idiot uncle Stafford didn’t post sentries, and his army was raw recruits. They were easily dispatched by Robb Stark’s veteran army. But the Lannisters still hold the Golden Tooth, and Tyrion is unsure how Robb was able to get past that stronghold.

Anyways, Sansa, what’s up with you and Joffrey? 

"I love him with all my heart," Sansa said at once.

"Truly?" He did not sound convinced. "Even now?"

"My love for His Grace is greater than it has ever been."

The Imp laughed aloud. "Well, someone has taught you to lie well. You may be grateful for that one day, child. You are a child still, are you not? Or have you flowered?"

Sansa knows that this is a rude question, but it doesn’t seem all that rude as compared to being stripped naked in front of all the castle. So, she tells Tyrion that she has not had her moon’s blood yet. Tyrion says that Sansa should be grateful for that.

Regardless, Tyrion isn’t planning to marry Joffrey to Sansa anyways. Yes, it was one of Robert Baratheon’s better notions, but Joffrey fucked that up royally. Sansa thinks she should say something, but she doesn’t know what to say. Tyrion notices this and asks if Sansa wants to be free from her betrothal to Joffrey.

"I . . . " Sansa did not know what to say. Is it a trick? Will he punish me if I tell the truth? She stared at the dwarf's brutal bulging brow, the hard black eye and the shrewd green one, the crooked teeth and wiry beard. "I only want to be loyal."

"Loyal," the dwarf mused, "and far from any Lannisters. I can scarce blame you for that. When I was your age, I wanted the same thing." He smiled. "They tell me you visit the godswood every day. What do you pray for, Sansa?"

I pray for Robb's victory and Joffrey's death . . . and for home. For Winterfell. "I pray for an end to the fighting."

Tyrion replies that the fighting will be over soon enough. Sure, Robb won the battle, but Tywin would settle the issue once and for all. But Sansa thinks that Robb will beat Tywin just like she beat Jaime and Stafford. And Tyrion seems to read her face. He warns her that Oxcross was just one battle. And Tywin isn’t Stafford. When Sansa visits the godswood next, Tyrion wants her to pray that Robb has the wisdom to bend the knee. And if Robb bends the knee, Tyrion will send Sansa home.

Tyrion then offers Sansa the safety of the Tower of the Hand to sleep here and some of his own guards to protect her, but Sansa doesn’t want that. She thinks that if she has Tyrion’s men guarding her, Dontos will never be able to get her away from King’s Landing. Sansa sort-of lies to Tyrion and says that the mountain clansmen scare her, but Tyrion brushes her off, saying that the clansmen scare him too, but they also scare Joffrey. 

"I would sooner return to my own bed." A lie came to her suddenly, but it seemed so right that she blurted it out at once. "This tower was where my father's men were slain. Their ghosts would give me terrible dreams, and I would see their blood wherever I looked."

Tyrion Lannister studied her face. "I am no stranger to nightmares, Sansa. Perhaps you are wiser than I knew. Permit me at least to escort you safely back to your own chambers.”

And that is ACOK, Sansa III! Like we were saying last week about Arya VII, I have to say: this is my favorite Sansa chapter so far in ACOK. What did you think, Emmett?

Depth

We thought we were so clever to structure our episodes on this chunk of ACOK this way, putting the Catelyn chapters together. Little did we realize that meant we’d be jumping from one of the hardest to read scenes in ASOIAF, Chiswyck’s story in Arya VII, to another of the hardest to read scenes in ASOIAF, Joffrey having Sansa stripped and beaten in public. 

But putting these chapters together does help illuminate the larger points George is driving at. Like Arya VII, Sansa III is a nightmare in service of radicalization, acting as a delegitimizing force aimed at every member of the royal court. As with Chiswyck’s story, the point is not only that vicious predators are running Westeros; it’s that everyone else is standing, watching, and doing nothing. (Almost everyone, anyway.) George presents such vivid detailed horrors to make his audience feel, not just know but feel, that things are rotten in the state of Westeros. 

As I’ve said a number of times on this podcast, I didn’t read the books until after Season 2. So, my first impression of this scene derives from the show. So, it’s fun coming back to this chapter in 2020, some 8 years after I saw it on-screen and 7 years after I read it. 

All of the nightmarish aspects of people watching a thirteen year old girl beaten and sexually assaulted and doing nothing are preserved even if things are changed from book to show. For instance, in the books, Joffrey has Sansa brought to the lower bailey. In the show, Joffrey is atop the Iron Throne. In ACOK, Sansa spends the evening at the Tower of the Hand where Tyrion and her converse. In the show, they condense it down to Tyrion talking with Sansa as they exit the throne room. 

These changes are fine (in fact, really good in changing the setting from the lower bailey to the Iron Throne). But the visual medium adds something to the text with Jack Gleeson, Jerome Flynn, Peter Dinklage and especially Sophie Turner doing justice to the source material with some excellent acting. Sophie Turner’s delivery of “I am loyal to Joffrey, my one true love” as she adopts her lady’s face with tears still streaking her face just hits me. So, well done, show. You did this scene well. But that sense of horror as seen in the show stems from this chapter in ACOK, and the horror builds from dreadful foundation.

• The dreadful buildup
  • From the very first words of this chapter, the tension and dread that defined the previous Sansa chapters in the book have been ramped up to a sickening degree
  • “The longer you keep him waiting, the worse it will go for you.” We don’t need to be told who “him” is, because Joffrey looms so large over these chapters 
  • Every action Sansa takes, even the smallest gesture, is taken with Joffrey in mind because he has power over her and has repeatedly used it violently
  • It’s the prison of the abuse victim wherein everything must be designed to please and placate the abuser; not even the victim is focused on her own well-being
  • Her thoughts are so frantic and desperate; as with Chiswyck’s story, we’re in a state of painful unease that achieves catharsis in the most hideous way possible
  • Like the Others, the appearance of Joffrey in ACOK is an effective use of a monster by GRRM.
  • Back in the early days of NAC, I talked about the Others as “monsters on the margins”, and I think GRRM uses the same narrative tactic here with Joffrey.
  • Though we saw Joffrey briefly in ACOK, Tyrion IV and Sansa II, we haven’t had a face-to-face interaction with Joffrey since ACOK, Sansa I.
  • Keeping monsters mostly off-page makes their sudden appearance on-page that much more effective and scary.
  • So, when we know from the first sentence that we’re going to meet our monster from the very first line, our dread matches Sansa’s.
  • Sansa armors herself in courtesy because it’s the only tool available to her; this is where George combines his social critique with his genre commentary
  • When her story began, Sansa thought of her lady’s toolbox--courteous words, fine clothes, etc--as a set of signifiers that would unlock the good life for her
  • Now these signifiers are in tatters, papering over an abyss. The stained glass window shattered, but Sansa has only its shards with which to defend herself
  • George is showing us how the songs and stories lied to Sansa and how she has to forge a new identity out of the pieces left behind: the idea of the courteous lady
  • Yet Sansa cannot truly save herself from Joffrey. He doesn’t care about what actions she takes, because it’s not her actions he’s holding her responsible for:
    • “Tell me what I’ve done.”
      
      “Not you. Your kingly brother.”
  • As Sansa admitted in Sansa I, Joffrey’s actions depend on whether he decides to play the gallant or not. If he doesn’t, nice words and a pretty dress won’t save her
  • In fact, they only serve to enrage him further, because at some level Joffrey knows that Sansa’s courtesy is a lie, just as Sandor and Tyrion do
  • And, not to get too self-referential, this gets back to something we talked about back in ACOK, Sansa I: her relative non-value as a hostage.
  • Putting aside that Joffrey is a sadist, Sansa’s only two values as a hostage are that her life means that Jaime stays alive and much more distantly: that she’s betrothed to Joffrey.
  • None of these things have any value to Joffrey who both doesn’t know that Jaime is his father and to get to that sadism angle, views other humans as playthings to torture and murder.
  • The only thing that cows Joffrey from outright murdering Sansa is his mom -- which … yeah, shit’s real bad when Cersei is the moderating influence on Joffrey. 
  • But there’s something else about Sansa’s hostage situation that really sticks out on re-read, and that’s how much the Lannisters are trusting the Starks to be “the good guys” in this whole hostage situation
  • Consider what Sansa thinks: Gods be good, don't let it be the Kingslayer. If Robb had harmed Jaime Lannister, it would mean her life.
  • I feel a lot of outrage at what we’re about to unpack here in a moment, but this line struck me on re-read as another layer of outrage.
  • At some level, the Lannisters (all of them!) are trusting that the Starks don’t engage in reciprocity against their hostage (Jaime) while also being prepared to far exceed the reciprocity of treating hostages.
  • To put it in blunt terms, Joffrey (and all the Lannisters!) expect Jaime to continue receiving gentler treatment than they give Sansa, but if Jaime gets harmed, they’ll fucking kill Sansa.
  • I’ll have a bit more to say about the hostage situation when we address Tyrion’s interaction with Sansa in the Tower of the Hand, but this hypocrisy (Is that the right word?) adds another galling layer to the atrocious behavior the Lannister inflict on Sansa. 
• Joffrey’s justice
  • I agree with you about the visually striking nature of the scene in the show; the throne room makes much more sense for the medium of television
  • But I like in the books that it’s happening in the lower bailey, because it captures how this is both official and unofficial
  • On the one hand, this is the king ordering his Kingsguard around, but on the other, they’re doing it in the equivalent of the Red Keep gym
  • The casualness of it is part of what makes it devastating, as with Chiswyck’s story in Arya VII
  • Joffrey tells Sansa right away that there are no strategies that will save her: “kneeling won’t save you now.” What a chilling thing for a king to say!
  • He’ll say much the same thing after the Red Wedding: I want them all dead, I won’t have any generous terms. Joffrey simply cannot rule in peacetime, because for him, violence is a feature of kingship, not a bug
  • Sansa tries to appeal to the one kernel of rationality left in the kid’s brain: I’m not Robb. I didn’t do what he did. I am not responsible.
  • But Joffrey needs someone upon whom to vent his rage, because this was not supposed to happen. He would’ve beat Robb in the Winterfell yard, dammit!
  • He feels impotent, humiliated, less than a king, less than a man. And like so many characters in this story and men in real life, he takes it out on a woman
  • This is where Joffrey becomes Robert writ-small. No, of course, he’s not the biological son of Robert Baratheon, but his idolization of his “father” has altered his psychology.
  • I’m reminded of the night after the first day of the Hand’s Tourney when Sansa witnesses Robert screaming at Cersei, and then we learn from the next chapter that Robert was enraged, because Cersei told him he couldn’t participate in the melee.
  • Sansa notices Joffrey having a “queer look in his eyes” after Robert’s outburst, and look, as much as Joff is a sadistic shit, we can’t discount the psychological impact of Cersei’s coddling and, more important for our purposes here, Robert’s violent outbursts against his mom when she makes him feel immasculated.
  • And so Joffrey, despite, again, not being Robert’s biological son, has all the worst learned behaviors of Robert and exercises them here against Sansa Stark.
  • Of course, even armed with a crossbow, even full of murderous rage, Joffrey on his own would not be so dangerous if grown adults didn’t do what he tells them
  • That starts even before Boros Blount starts beating Sansa. It starts with the court flunkies surrounding Joffrey, cheering him on, laughing at Sansa’s pain, refusing to meet her eye. These people are the problem, even more than Joffrey himself
  • This corruption of the court continues with Lancel. Sansa had always thought him comely and well-spoken, like a knight out of the songs, as he presents himself
  • But we know that Lancel is a kingslayer and a spy twice over, with barely a shred of honor in him, and so it’s no surprise he turns so viciously on Sansa here
  • He vomits some absurd propaganda about Robb that gives even the Freys at White Harbor a run for their money, all while looking at Sansa with loathing
  • Now...Lancel’s not the sharpest tool in the box, but he probably knows better than this. It doesn’t matter, though. This is the narrative that Joffrey believes, this is the one that feeds his anger, this is the one that makes Sansa look inhuman
  • Hence the talk of the direwolves, dragging us back to the primal scene at Darry in which Sansa’s relationship to both Joffrey and her family were put to the test
  • Sansa lost her wolf and her father, leaving her vulnerable to Joffrey, whereas he can’t get at Robb, out there with his wolf and army surrounding him
  • So he heaps it all on Sansa, and orders her brutally beaten by his Kingsguard.
    These are grown fighting men, armed and armored, not holding back as they strike a defenseless girl. It’s appalling, it’s sickening, it’s infuriating
  • We’re seeing Chiswyck’s story from Arya VII, but from the inside: how it feels to have your world fall apart in a blaze of pain and blood while the crowd cheers
  • Not content with hurting her, Joffrey orders her stripped naked, because there’s more than just anger at Robb at work here: Joffrey is also getting aroused
  • It’s the clearest evidence that Joffrey is a full-on sadist, his sexual urges connected to violence and absolute power over others
  • Here, I think, is where the parallel to the Mad King becomes unmistakable; we learn later that Aerys eventually could only become aroused by burning people alive, and Dany was conceived (via rape) under those circumstances
  • Like Aerys, Joffrey is as blunt an illustration of irresponsible power as you can imagine, someone utterly unworthy of authority using it only to cause pain
  • And like Aerys, Joffrey is aided and abetted in his cruelty by all these well-bred well-dressed people just standing by, or worse, helping him do it
  • Sansa sticks to Sandor’s non-burned side because that’s the side untouched by monsters like Gregor, like Joffrey, like Aerys, who so loved burning people alive
  • I love that show-only line by Jaime about what the enabling class did while Aerys burned Rickard and strangled Brandon:
    • Five hundred men just stood there and watched. All the great knights of the Seven Kingdoms, you think anyone said a word, lifted a finger? No, Lord Stark. Five hundred men and this room was silent as a crypt...except for the screams, of course, and the Mad King laughing.
  • That’s a haunting line that stuck with me so hard that I thought it came from ASOIAF. Only in doing research for this episode did I realize my memory was in error (again, S01 > AGOT. Stop looking at me)
  • But there’s something stomach-churning about scene from Sansa III:
    • Boros shoved a meaty hand down the front of Sansa's bodice and gave a hard yank. The silk came tearing away, baring her to the waist. Sansa covered her breasts with her hands. She could hear sniggers, far off and cruel. 
  • The silence that Show!Jaime remembers when his mad king committed atrocity has been replaced by the laughter of the enabling class.
  • I keep saying it, but GRRM is layering the horror and abuse here with just another aspect which makes it that much more enraging for the reader and humiliating for Sansa. 
  • As usual, it is only the outcasts, the marginalized and belittled, who at least try to do the right thing. Sandor declares “enough” and gives Sansa his cloak; Dontos goes further and mock-beats Sansa to try and sate Joffrey with laughter
  • The not-knights are living up to the knightly vows far more than the actual knights, who are concerned only with subservience to power
  • It is Tyrion, the ugly pariah dwarf, who steps in to save Sansa and call out Joffrey and Blount on their dishonorable behavior; to further emphasize the point, George flanks Tyrion with Bronn and Timmet, both lowborn, neither knights (yet)
  • Bronn underlines it further by scorning the “pretty white cloaks” of the Kingsguard; Bronn may be ruthless scum, but at least he’s not pretending
  • Maybe the best illustration of this image v. reality theme is how Sansa thinks that Sandor’s scratchy wool cloak feels finer than any velvet she’s ever worn
  • First Book Sansa would’ve been all about the velvet, all about the surface appearance, but now she knows better: she perceives the substance
  • Sandor’s cloak feels fine because it is protecting her, whereas the world of fancy dresses and story and song left her vulnerable
  • Sansa is coming to a more clear understanding of how power actually works, and so a more clear understanding of what will and won’t keep her safe
  • Just to add-onto your excellent point about Sansa finding the fancy world leaving her vulnerable, just consider the effort Sansa uses at the start of this chapter to get into an ill-fitting dress 
  • And then a knight of the kingsguard, the ostensible face of chivalry, rips her dress, because a king ordered it.
  • But Sandor’s white cloak protects her honor and keeps her warm against the cold, empty void that is the face of the high lords, ladies and Sworn Swords of the court of King Joffrey.
  • I love how GRRM is uses the different types of clothing to help symbolize how Sansa is starting to understand the real face of chivalry 
• The aftermath
  • Sansa enters a fugue state after she’s whisked away, describing it as feeling like a dream; Arya also dissociates while Weese is beating her after Chiswyck’s story
  • With no assassin to strike back for her, all Sansa can do is try to recover, inside and out, and it’s significant that George has her do so in the Tower of the Hand
  • This is a literal regression for Sansa; we’ve been brought back to where she lived in book one, to the moment she describes as her father falling from grace
  • What a telling choice of words! It hints at a descent beyond the political and the physical: it is the death of an ideal, the ruination of a way of looking at the world
  • It’s as if in her disconnected state, Sansa has slipped the bonds of time and gone back not only to the Tower of the Hand, but to the person she used to be
  • She’s on the other side of her family’s fall from grace, and so she knows now that the comforting words spoken by the servants are meaningless; she knows that the maester is bullshitting about everything feeling better in the morning
  • It’s as if George is deliberately highlighting how Sansa’s character is progressing even as her external circumstances stay the same for multiple books
  • Above all, Sansa now realizes the point I made earlier: Joffrey isn’t the main problem. He’s a symptom, not the disease. The disease is a corrupt detached elite untethered from the values they proclaim to uphold, the values of the songs
  • “All she could see were the faces in the bailey.” Sansa doesn’t put their names down on a kill list like her sister, but it’s the same moment of radicalization, the realization that the center does not hold and the system doesn’t provide justice
  • This passage in particular is one of the more blunt thesis statements in ASOIAF:
    • Knights are sworn to defend the weak, protect women, and fight for the right, but none of them did a thing. Only Ser Dontos had tried to help, and he was no longer a knight, no more than the Imp was, nor the Hound...the Hound hated knights...I hate them too, Sansa thought. They are no true knights, not one of them.
  • The political core of ASOIAF in my opinion is a deep skepticism that power can ever be used for good, coupled with an abiding belief that values are being upheld on the margins, by people who do not fit the social status, physical appearance, temperament etc. popularly associated with those values
  • This is refracted through fantasy as a genre through the shorthand of “stories and songs,” which in ASOIAF stand in for the manufactured consensus that beauty = good, that the nobles are literally noble, that Yoren was a dirty rebel, etc.
  • Character growth in ASOIAF is consistently linked to shedding one’s naive detached worldview rooted in stories and songs, working instead to uphold the values contained within them, but in the context of a more realistic world
  • Sansa knows that knights do not uphold their vows, the way stories and songs say they do. Often as not, they do the opposite. The vows are being upheld by the people not bound by them, an irony which is both pessimistic and optimistic
  • Pessimistic because there’s only so much the likes of Davos and Brienne can do to change a system that will barely even let them in the door
  • Optimistic because it demonstrates that power is never absolute, that even the shittiest political, economic, and social systems can’t quench the human spirit
  • We see that with Sandor Clegane, with whom Sansa feels a kinship here; it’s not just gratitude for his help, it’s a genuine philosophical connection, part of her arc
• Tyrion’s role
  • This is a Sansa chapter, of course, but it’s also a very important story beat for Tyrion, so I thought he should get his own separate slice of the conversation
  • He enters the chapter exactly like a hero in a song should: bringing the proceedings to a halt with his stern authoritative voice, shaming the villains for their lack of honor, and bringing the victim under his personal protection
  • Sansa then links him with Dontos and Sandor in her mind as protectors upholding the values of knighthood despite not being knights themselves
  • So far, Tyrion’s coming out of this looking pretty good, like he’s finally doing justice as promised...but then George starts undercutting that image
  • Sansa asks right away if she’s Tyrion’s prisoner; he replies that she is his guest, but she’s closer to the mark. She’s still not free. She’s still a hostage
  • Even as Tyrion insists that Sansa is not his prisoner, George makes sure to emphasize the chain around his neck. Hint hint. 
  • Tyrion speaks gently to Sansa and doesn’t have her beaten; this makes him a significantly better individual than Joffrey. But in terms of power, he is implicated in Joffrey’s actions because he’s working to keep Joffrey on the Iron Throne
  • Unstated here, but important to keep in mind as we talk about Tyrion’s words to Sansa, is that Tyrion is still playing openly that he has both Stark girls.
  • And let’s not forget how Tyrion spoke about Sansa’s status back in Tyrion VI
    • "As you say. And his sisters?"
      
      Tyrion glanced toward Sansa, and felt a stab of pity as he said, "Until such time as he frees my brother Jaime, unharmed, they shall remain here as hostages. How well they are treated depends on him."
  • As you say, Tyrion treats Sansa better, but Tyrion implicitly legitimized Joffrey’s abuse of Sansa.
  • No, I don’t think Tyrion was thinking of Joffrey here, but consider that Tyrion is stating that Sansa’s gentle treatment in King’s Landing is predicated first upon Jaime being freed and secondly on how well Jaime is treated by the Starks.
  • Tyrion gives the game away when he describes Joffrey as his bane, similar to Robb’s role in Tywin’s life; he’s equating his king and nephew to the enemy!
  • He also admits that he, too, wanted to be far away from the Lannisters as a child, practically acknowledging that he feels more of a kinship to the Starks than his own family, but even so, his authority to help her is rooted in Joffrey’s crown
  • Like Sandor, Tyrion notes that Sansa has been taught to lie well; the point is not that her words are believed, but that they signal compliance and submission
  • They communicate fear: I am afraid of you, so I will say flattering things I transparently do not believe. And that’s enough for Joffrey and Cersei even as they scorn and abuse her for it, because as Joffrey says in this chapter, they believe that fear is the source of all power, that fear is better than love
  • Joffrey points to Sansa’s trembling bloody body and says that is proof that he is a good king. As with Chiswyck’s story, the failure of the system is laid bare
  • Tyrion is quite correct in his counterarguments: fear is no way to win people over, and regardless, Stannis and Renly are not remotely afraid of you, kid! He’s also right that Joffrey is headed down a path very similar to that of Mad King Aerys
  • But declaring these things in public, backed up by threats and insults, is signing your own death warrant when Joffrey comes of age
  • All of this is going to be used as damning evidence against Tyrion in his trial for Joffrey’s murder come ASOS; we know he didn’t do it, and it’s still convincing! 
  • It’s very telling that Tyrion’s trump card against Joffrey is the threat of getting Cersei involved; that accidentally reveals the weakness of his own position
  • Cersei is consistently smarter about how to handle the Starks than Joffrey, if only because she cares more about preserving Jaime’s life than he does; she would put a stop to this, and judging from Joffrey’s flushed face, he knows it
  • But Cersei is also the woman who prepares to execute Sansa if Stannis takes the city! Cersei is the one who taught Joffrey all this horrible shit to begin with!
  • So that is the very definition of a short-term solution. It helps save Sansa’s skin, and I’m very glad about that! But Joffrey keeps getting worse and worse. Tywin will also confront this intractable problem after the Red Wedding
  • Even as Tyrion tries to heed his best angels, even as he demonstrably rules more sensibly and kindly than his sister and her brat, he cannot get around this paradox of his bane being the king he’s working to hard to keep in power
  • So you get contradictions like Tyrion saying he doesn’t mean for Sansa to ever marry Joffrey because there’s no reconciling Stark and Lannister, but also saying that he will send Sansa home after Robb bends the knee
  • Why would Robb bend the knee any time soon? He just won another victory, the Lannisters could lose King’s Landing to either Baratheon while Tywin marches west, and as Tyrion just pointed out, he still hates their guts!
  • What Tyrion has to know but doesn’t want to admit to Sansa is that she is their ultimate defense against Robb. That’s why he needs her alive and well, not because he cares about her--because if the Lannisters ever want Jaime back and the ability to sue for peace, they need Sansa to do it
  • And as Dontos points out to Sansa at the end of the book, ending the betrothal does not protect Sansa from Joffrey. He can still beat her and rape her and do whatever he wants, because of the same dynamic we see in this chapter: he’s the king, and even the adults who know better draw their power from his own
  • When Tyrion in full hero mode confronts Boros Blount about beating Sansa, it’s a powerful moment because as with Chiswyck’s death, one of the people responsible for making Westeros hell is called out on it
  • It’s very cathartic when Tyrion tells Blount to shut his fucking child abusing mouth or he’ll have Bronn kill him! There’s a reason the show took this line for line!
  • But what does Blount say? That he obeys his king. How can Tyrion respond, when his smartest moves merely serve to prop Joffrey up above better kings?
• Sansa’s evolution
  • Sansa doesn’t have access to nearly as much information about all this as the reader, but her instincts serve her well
  • She really shows off how far she’s come at the very end of the chapter, when a brilliant manipulation comes to her as pure instinct
  • She pretends to be more naive, more sheltered, more childish than she really is--afraid of ghosts--so she can preserve her hopes to escape
  • This is so powerful because Sansa is essentially wearing her younger self as a mask to serve larger political ends: denying the Lannisters her as a hostage
  • And it works! It strikes at the heart of the kinship Tyrion feels for the Starks: that as a child, he was more like them than his fellow Lannisters. He has ghosts, too.
  • It’s one more great parallel with Arya, and her towers that may or may not be haunted by ghosts. Whether the ghosts are there matters less than our characters’ relationships to them
  • There are certainly differences in their circumstances. Arya has to work, which Sansa doesn’t; Sansa has to deal with being watched and overheard more
  • Arya gets a guardian who can do anything, maybe too much; Sansa gets guardians who can’t help her even when they’re genuinely trying their best
  • But the characters themselves run parallel. Arya is the ghost in Harrenhal now; Sansa spins her own ghost stories The Stark sisters are growing up in ACOK
  • I love the detail that she’s in Arya’s old room, just to emphasize the parallels between the sisters even as they get farther apart. They share this physical space because they’re sharing a mental/emotional space, the same revelation. They’re hundreds of miles away but still side by side where it counts
• The Battle of Oxcross
  • The most prominent off-screen battle in ASOIAF also deserves its own section. So what does your military mind make of Robb’s victory at Oxcross, Jeff?
  • Slipping into the Westerlands
    • Robb’s movement into the Westerlands is just as fascinating as the battles he fought out in the west.
    • How did he get past the Golden Tooth undetected? This is the only aspect that puzzles Tyrion Lannister.
    • Martyn Rivers, a Frey bastard, provides the explanation in ACOK, Catelyn V: 
      • "How did the king ever take the Tooth?" Ser Perwyn Frey asked his bastard brother. "That's a hard strong keep, and it commands the hill road."
        
        "He never took it. He slipped around it in the night. It's said the direwolf showed him the way, that Grey Wind of his. The beast sniffed out a goat track that wound down a defile and up along beneath a ridge, a crooked and stony way, yet wide enough for men riding single file. The Lannisters in their watchtowers got not so much a glimpse of them." (ACOK, Catelyn V)
    • Ironically, Tyrion is just a little wrong and Joffrey is a little right about whether sorcery/magic was at play insomuch as Robb was likely warging Grey Wind and that magical bond between wolf and man allowed Robb to find the goat path that led them into the Westerlands.
    • As for using the goat path, we see GRRM borrowing from history: Alexander the Great and Hannibal
      • As Steven Attewell has written, Robb Stark using a goat path to get around a stronghold has hallmarks of Alexander the Great during the Battle of the Sogdian Rock. In that battle, Alexander the Great ordered three hundred of his men up a mountainous goat path to bypass the Bactrian fortress known as the Sogdian Rock, thus leading to the fortress’ surrender.
      • But I argue that GRRM is borrowing from Hannibal’s legendary passage into Italy over the Alps. 
  • Night raid at Oxcross
    • Stafford the Dumbass
      • Before we even start unpacking the battle, let’s talk briefly about our undearly departed Stafford Lannister.
      • If you’ll recall from TWOIAF, Ser Stafford Lannister was both cousin and brother-in-law to Tywin (having been a potential younger brother to Joanna)
      • No one thinks he’s hot shit. When he was taken prisoner by Ellyn Tarbeck to effect a hostage exchange in the lead-up to the Reyne-Tarbeck Rebellion, Tywin advised his dad to murder their own prisoners and let Stafford die. And Jaime and Tyrion both think he’s an idiot.
      • But he ends up in command of the Westerlands army, because … who else do the Lannisters have on the bench to raise an army?
      • And Stafford immediately makes a botch of things by assuming he’s safe in the west. I understand at a level: he’s got the Golden Tooth to block any movement west, and Robb Stark has Tywin to deal with.
      • But at another level, this is just lazy, shitty leadership on Stafford’s part, and he should have known better given how Robb Stark’s army has materialized at the worst, unexpected spots already at the Whispering Wood and at Riverrun.
      • And Stafford knows this, because part of his army is comprised of the remnants of Jaime’s force led by Ser Forley Prester
      • GRRM commented on this in a So Spake Martin in which he said: I expect that he sent many of them down to Ser Stafford. Blooded veterans to help train the raw green levies... of course, that didn't work out too well...
    • Robb Stark: actually of the night
      • Robb’s continued use of night attacks and raids proves effective in counteracting any numerical disadvantage Robb faces in moving west
      • And again, like I talked about back in episode 63, Robb Stark using a night raid is unique!
      • Historically-speaking, most ancient and medieval battles didn’t occur at night, because it was extraordinarily difficult to control different elements of the army without radios.
      • Adding the lack of visibility makes it doubly difficult.
      • And that’s why the plan had to be simple. 
    • Keep it simple, stupid
      • A long, long time ago, I had the opportunity to train with a Special Forces team, and me, being a dumbass 20 y/o, asked these guys what the magical tactics were that made them so successful? One grizzled SF Team Sergeant (who looked and spoke like Jeff Foxworthy) looked me over and drawled, “Boy, we don’t do different shit. We just train the same shit over and over again until we know our shit in and out.”
      • And that’s what Robb does at Oxcross. The plan isn’t some magical battle plan (well, it is a little). It’s a three-phased operation
        • Cut the horse-lines
        • Deploy Grey Wind to scare the bejesus out of the horses
        • Unified cavalry charge while chaos envelopes the Lannister camp
        • Stafford killed by Rickard Karstark
  • Aftermath: Robb’s Westerlands campaign/Tywin moves west/Harrenhal falls to Roose Bolton
    • We’ll talk about Robb’s Westerlands campaign towards the end of this episode and we’re going to have a pretty great discussion on the ethics of Robb’s chevauchee in the Westerlands in later Catelyn ACOK and ASOS chapters, but I think it’s important for our purposes to outline why this victory was just as impressive as Robb’s earlier victories in AGOT:
      • The Westerlands were now open for Robb to move through at will
      • Robb’s victory meant that Tywin was faced with a shitty choice: stay at Harrenhal to protect King’s Landing or head west to save the homeland
      • Tywin chooses the westerlands and seemingly abandons King’s Landing to its fate
        • This allows Roose Bolton to take Harrenhal
  • George will go on to scatter the news of Oxcross across multiple POVs, showing us the reaction in each camp: Winterfell in Bran V, Harrenhal in Arya VIII, Riverrun in Catelyn V
  • But it’s worth noting how the first exposition we get about the battle plays out with these specific characters
  • I love it when Sansa exults that “Robb will kill you all,” allowing the reader to feel not only the thrill of Robb’s unexpected victory, but also the liberation of Sansa celebrating her brother’s crusade on the inside even as she maintains her courtesies on the outside
  • I’m so strongly with her in this moment as she aims her silent thoughts like a weapon at Tyrion, so intensely that he feels and responds to them
  • I also love that Tyrion calls back to his monologue in Tyrion V about Robb v. Tywin when he says that Robb has proved himself to be “no fawn.”
  • Sansa wasn’t even present for that conversation, so this is purely for our benefit, a signpost that Tyrion is all too aware that his confident framing of the Lannister war footing to Cersei in that earlier Tyrion chapter was bullshit
  • In truth, they are in deep trouble. Tyrion tried to shore up this politically dire position by reaching out to the Martells, and in his next chapter, he will propose the alliance with the Tyrells, which is what saves the Lannisters from destruction
  • But on reread, I found myself thinking more and more about Tywin’s reaction to the Battle of Oxcross. What a humiliation this is for him on every level!
  • His cousin killed, the army he was waiting on scattered. The Golden Tooth, the guarantee his vassals’ lands would stay untouched, has been subverted
  • Said vassals’ lands are now at the mercy of the unstoppable charismatic young warrior-king who has now repeatedly made Tywin look dumb in front of his men
  • As you say, Tywin abandons the capital (and so his daughter, his son, and his grandson the king) to the Baratheons, despite considering them his primary foes
  • Such is the immediate existential threat posed by Robb’s army rampaging around the Westerlands at will, potentially threatening even Lannisport
  • A series of perfectly timed domino falls will deliver the Lannisters to victory by the end of the book. Only after the Blackwater, Roose taking Harrenhal, his bastard wiping out Stark loyalists at Winterfell, and Robb breaking his vow to the Freys on behalf of Jeyne Westerling does the Red Wedding become conceivable
  • Strategically, logistically, politically: all the infrastructure of the defining moment of the War of Five Kings, the defining atrocity of the story (so far), is still in the future
  • But the emotional core of it? The smoldering ember of resentment and rage that drove Tywin to not only defeat but obliterate Robb Stark? That starts here, now
  • I think Tywin vowed at this moment when all seemed lost that if he somehow made it out of this, he would make the rivers run red with the the KITN’s blood
  • And then the Fates--or rather, George--arranged everything to make his nightmarish dream come true. Tywin must have felt the gods were on his side…
  • Coming back to Sansa III, I feel like for all that Tywin is a far more intelligent and accomplished individual than Joffrey would ever be, the motivations are the same
  • Both lions feel their pride pricked by the Young Wolf’s traitorous insistence on being better than them at everything, and both try to wash it out with blood
  • And when we’re talking about the Red Wedding and the impact of Oxcross on it, we have to talk the timing and the butterfly effect
  • Because this is ASOIAF, Robb’s utter rout at Oxcross wouldn’t be complete without it helping to sow the seeds of Robb’s downfall.
  • First, the timing: this battle occurs just prior to Renly and Stannis’ parlay. Word takes 6 days to reach King’s Landing, and maybe it arrived a bit earlier at Harrenhal.
  • So, Tywin finds out about Oxcross, gets his army ready to march west, just as Stannis and Renly lock horns, and then Stannis spends a not insignificant amount of time besieging Storm’s End.
  • Tyrion dispatches Littlefinger to the Tyrells after Renly’s death as Tywin marches west, Edmure blocks Tywin’s crossing at the Stone Mill, Tyrell envoys reach Tywin just in time for Tywin and the Tyrells to mount barges and float to King’s Landing and defeat Stannis just prior to Stannis taking the city.
  • I’m on record as not being a big fan of AUs, but I’ll leave that aside for the moment and note that if battle occurs a day earlier or a day later, Stannis might have been in King’s Landing when the Lannister-Tyrells arrive outside of the walls. 
  • The timing is just so precise.
  • But as we’ll talk in significant depth for Bran V, the Stark side had casualties too, and the most significant casualty was Ser Stevron Frey.
  • As Robb will note in ASOS: "With Ser Stevron, I might have been able to make amends”
  • Maybe Robb is being a bit idealistic here, but it can’t be discounted that Stevron’s death meant that a Stark loyalist heir was out of the picture, replaced by Ryman and Black Walder.
  • So, while Steven Attewell argued (convincingly IMO) that the Hornwood Inheritance Crisis was the biggest piece in Robb’s downfall, we can’t discount how the Starks were able to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory -- through no fault of their own.

Foreshadowing/Groundwork

More #RiotWatch as Joffrey talks gleefully about killing starving protestors; they’ll rise up against him in force, just a couple Tyrion chapters from now.

The business with Sansa and Sandor’s cloak will pay off in dramatic fashion at the end of the Battle of Blackwater, when he leaves his cloak behind with her, oh so symbolically. 

Sansa’s thinking Tyrion looks ugly, coupled with Tyrion’s statement that he does not intend to marry Sansa to Joffrey work as foreshadowing for the coming Tyrion-Sansa marriage come ASOS.

Sansa says she hasn’t flowered yet, but she will get her first period in her next chapter.

Theory/Discussion

George has said he regrets not giving Robb a POV for the western campaign. How do we feel about that? How might Jeff have written an on-page Battle of Oxcross? Whose POV might have been interesting (assuming it’s not Robb himself)?

• Robb as a POV
  • First, let’s talk about Robb Stark as a POV character as GRRM has stated a few times that he regrets Robb not being a POV character. 
  • Here’s probably the most complete answer as to why GRRM feels this way from an interview Esquire-Russia did during GRRM’s 2017 St. Petersburg appearance:
    • Q: Do you regret that someone did not show as a POV?
      
      GRRM: Sometimes, yes. Although, I think that I have more than enough narratives (laughs) . Maybe even a little more than I need at this stage, and I need to kill a few characters. But I still regret most of all that I did not let Robb Stark be the main character in the early books. His death had already made a huge impression, but it could have had an even greater impact if throughout the whole history we saw a little more events with his eyes. Especially if they knew what happened to him in the westerlands, where he led his army and where he was wounded in the battle. He went out Jeyne Westerling, to whom he eventually married - and this, in turn, triggered a chain of events that led to the Red wedding. Of course, I'm here talking about the book, in the series everything goes a little differently. In the books, we learn about Robb, along with Cat in the chapters told from her POV. Robb came back and presented his new wife to his mother; we do not know what happened there, so for us it's like a bolt from the blue. And this is a very good scene, but if I gave Robb his own point of view, then the text could be even better.
  • So, basically, GRRM’s perspective on Robb is that he could have made ASOIAF better by:
    • Making the Red Wedding even more of an emotional gut-punch
    • Learning about the Westerlands campaign while it occurs instead of from reports from the Westerlands in ACOK and in retrospect from Brynden and Robb in ASOS
    • Adding more weight behind Robb’s marriage to Jeyne Westerling
  • Before we even talk about Oxcross and what happens in the Westerlands, my question to you ser: do you think ASOIAF is somewhat lessened by not having Robb as a POV?
  • Not really, to be honest! 
  • I like George’s decision to present the kings as non-POV characters; it forces us to interpret them the way their subjects and vassals do, trapping them in context
  • Stannis, in particular, I think is greatly enhanced by his non-POV status; if we were inside his head, it would just be more Victarion chapters
  • The only exception is Dany, which works because she’s isolated from the rest 
  • As I’ve said, Robb resonates for me in the context of Catelyn’s POV specifically: her firstborn who came into the world red-faced and squalling, the tiny life who accompanied her north, a stranger in a strange land after a devastating war
  • She keeps seeing the child inside the man, and even as she’s proud of him and recognizes the need for him to succeed as a warrior king, she instinctively wants to protect him, especially as she loses her other children (or seems to, anyway)
  • Robb also works for me juxtaposed with the Stark children who are POVs. They all live in Robb’s shadow (especially Jon), but they also look up to him
  • He recedes from history, but he burns brightly in their eyes. I like that!
  • Well-put, and I agree!
  • I sometimes get the sense from GRRM that if he’s not lending the spotlight to all areas of the War of the Five Kings, that he’s letting readers down.
  • But I don’t get that sense from not seeing the Westerlands. If anything, not being present for the battles in the west makes Robb a bit of a legend.
  • And as much 
  • Overall, I’m with you: the narrative of Robb Stark works best as seen through others as you put so well.
  • Plus, as I’ve stated in the past, we already have Robb Stark’s POV in the form of Ned chapters in AGOT and Catelyn chapters from AGOT-ACOK.
  • And I think the Red Wedding is much more horrible as seen through the eyes of Catelyn -- much as I think seeing Ned’s execution through Arya’s eyes and Sansa’s recollections conveys the horror and packs an effective narrative punch that’s reverberated through the zeitgeist to this day.
• How to write the Battle of Oxcross
  • So, anyways, forget everything I said about it being better not to have a POV out in the Westerlands. Let’s fan-fic it!
  • Something I appreciate in George’s style of writing battles is that he ends up making them unique: whether it’s Tyrion in the mud at the Green Fork, Catelyn’s poetry at the Whispering Wood, the Davos-Tyrion-Sansa dynamic showing all sides of the Blackwater, the visceral horror of Quentyn’s memories of Astapor, etc, GRRM gives his battles a uniqueness that makes you feel like you’re not reading the same thing over and over again.
  • So, what’s the narrative spark that would make the Battle of Oxcross unique?
  • The answer:
• A different POV?
  • Dacey Mormont! I like her dynamic with her mom Maege, and the Mormonts are a significant lesser House all the way through the story (and even in the show)

Conclusion

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• Join us next week for Jon IV *and* V, in which LC Mormont’s Great Ranging arrives at the Fist of the First Men and meets up with a stone cold badass named Qhorin Halfhand.
• Yes, and Jon finds a pile of junk that probably won’t pay off or be important at all... 
• And this will be our next live episode, so join us for that on Monday 1/9 at 830 PM EST!