Euron becomes Ironborn King even though he's been disinherited and isn't the rightful leader anyway. Robert and Ned go to war with their King and unseat him and his family. Renly decides to piss all over Stannis' right to become King purely because he thinks he'd be a better one. In his will, Robb writes that he would want Jon to succeed him as King even though Jon's in the Night's Watch and is a bastard.
Books A Song of Ice and Fire (Books) | TV show? What TV show?
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Euron becomes Ironborn King even though he's been disinherited and isn't the rightful leader anyway. Robert and Ned go to war with their King and unseat him and his family. Renly decides to piss all over Stannis' right to become King purely because he thinks he'd be a better one. In his will, Robb writes that he would want Jon to succeed him as King even though Jon's in the Night's Watch and is a bastard.
Game. Set. Match.
And lets not even start about Dance of Dragons and the Blackfyre Rebellion. Or you know, the Targaryan rule in the first place.
Yeah, he's quite literally someone who just ended up as the rightful King because he felt like it.
The show has been too liberal with succession sometimes: Ellaria and the Sand Snakes murdering Doran and taking Dorne with no opposition whatsoever was piss poor writing, but then Dorne's been awful from start to finish.
The entire point is though that chaos currently reigns throughout Westeros and normal succession laws are being thrown out of the window. Had a crisis in leadership in the North ensued during Robert's rule then it'd have been sorted out appropriately; as it stands the throne's held by a mentalist who doesn't control half of the Kingdoms she's trying to rule. After just seizing the throne because she felt like it herself. Seems to be something some people are missing, even if there have been some plotting issues as well.
Umm.. no, it's not.
Blackfyre Rebellion is because Aegon the Unworthy legitimized all bastards by decree, making the Blackfyre pretenders legitimate contenders for the throne. In fact, Blackfyre rebellion should be ultimate proof that even though legitimized, bastards were seen as contenders. Dance of the Dragons were between two siblings of Viserys, Rhaenyra favored by King, but small council wanting a male heir. Small council was by then an established tradition.
Dorne is a world apart from Westeros, where paramours are not frowned upon and bastard borns having equal rights. As for Iron Islands, Quoting verbatim from the World of Ice and Fire
"Elsewhere in Westeros, petty kings claimed crows of gold by virtue of their birth and blood, but the driftwood crowns of the ironborn were not so easily won. Here alone in all of Westeros men made their own kings, assembling in great councils called kingsmoots to choose the rock and salt kings who would rule over them"
There is precedent and history of how the priests lost their power and Iron Islands and how kingsmoot custom slowly lost their importance (succession battle between Urrathon Goodbrother of Great Wyk and Torgon Greyiron being the beginning and Urron Greyiron killing everybody assembled at his own kingsmoot) and how the faith of seven influenced some traditions on the Iron Islands later after the Harren the Black. Which is why when Aeron Damphair calls a kingsmoot and a 'return to the old ways', people are excited and when Euron promises them reaving the old iron way, they choose him.
Robert and Eddard Stark raise a rebellion because the king is mad, but the succession to the throne is not settled and goes to the Baratheons because there are no more Targaryeans and Baratheons claim the right to rule because of their Targaryean blood.
I'm kind of done with discussing this with people who have read the five novels and think they know everything. Meh
Dany overthrows a few leaders in a few cities on the Eastside.
And as Revan mentions the whole Tag dynasty.
You know what, Children of the Forest occupied Westeros first, First Men came and conquered, and then Andals come, and then Rhoynar settled in Dorne and they all snatched power. So there you go, everyone who has power can be a king. Settled. 
Is a World of Ice and Fire worth buying? Do you get stories and accounts about the famous battles of the past, the doom of Valeryia, the Long Night, etc? Has anyone read it?
EDIT : Not sure how to upload images ffs. Edit 2 : Finally done it right
I borrowed it from Library multiple times but haven't made a decision to buy it. It's a beautiful book full of illustrations and color. It's a big book as well.
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Yes. Really fleshes out the history of Westeros and the legends.
Just to bring us around to the discussion topic, the issue that started it all was some who claimed it was inconsistent/made no sense within the world created by GRRM that Jon could become King of the North.
So basically you just gave a bunch of examples as to why it is not always a clear line of succession and how people's within Westeros changed things to meet their own needs/desires/quest for power (your information about the Iron Islands and how things changed, then Euron wanted to return to the old ways).
And yeah Dorne is part of Westeros even if they have different customs, well each area within the world has it's own customs.
Your whole post just supports that it is very consistent within the story being presented for someone to get made King/Queen based on something other than the normal rights of succession.
Also minor point, there were in fact still living Targ's left after Robert's rebellion. One of them is still a main character, the other was pretty prominent until he tried his gold crown on.
Just as a sidenote: who's saying Sansa ISN'T head of Winterfell? She's being approached as Lady of Winterfell pretty much since her return. King in the North doesn't mean Jon is Lord of Winterfell. You just assume it because Rob, by chance, had both titles.
When we look back into history, there's multiple instances where a king isn't head of his house, especially when being newly appointed.
Kings can be overthrown by conquest. There's no succession problem, there's ascension. There have been multiple wars fought due to succession but all of them have been due to a lack of a clear successor. You gave specific examples of power grabs and I tried to explain why that occurred within the customs of Westeros. Iron Islands for example, never had a queen and there was no living son of Balon Greyjoy is present at the Iron Islands. This creates problems with succession and there is conflict.
What @InfiniteBoredom said was, Northmen accepting a bastard and a oathbreaker readily as a King in the North in the show was poorly handled, but in the book, there is a reason for succession with Robb Stark's declaration. Robb Stark himself is a pretender according to the Iron Thrones, but there's a claim for Jon Snow for being the King in the North based on this as opposed to 'fought with the white walkbers brahhhh' nonsense. Which makes perfect sense. Nobody is saying Jon Snow has no right, just that it's not properly handled. To be fair, I had problems even with Ramsay Bolton becoming a warden of North so easily for all the 'North remembers' punchline.
Starks have pretty much ruled the North before Targaryens for thousands of years from Winterfell. I'd say it is highly unlikely there is another king in the north who isn't the head honcho of Winterfell. I agree that King's position is sometimes a figurehead, especially young kings with powerful positions such as Hands ruling in his stead.
It's not about regents. Karl X to Karl XII were kings of Sweden while not being head of house Wittelsbach. It was very common. Basically, treat John as a subline of house Stark. Just like the Karstarks essentially. He's king of the north, but house stark still holds Winterfell. Remember, he's not only king of the north, but also the vale and likely the riverlands.
The head of Stark family (Lord of Winterfell) has always been King in the North.
Not sure that he is King of Vale and Riverlands. They were there when it happened, and went with the bandwagon but cannot see a reason why Vale should have him as a king. In addition, the Riverlands swore to Robb cause of Catelyn, the same cannot be said for Jon. And that is without mentioning that there isn't much in Riverlands nowadays. He is King in the North with support from the Vale which is controlled from LF.
It consensus that he is king of the vale. Anyway, not the point really. Yes, it might have been like that in the past. But lines can split. The king of Hanover also was, for a long time, king of England. But because differences in the line of succession, he wasn't anymore and Victoria became queen. She wasn't head of her house though. That was still the king of Hanover. Just like her successor, Edward, wasn't head of house Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha. It's perfectly normal for things like that to happen.
Basically, the north chose someone as successor to Rob who isn't also successor to his position as lord of Winterfell, which will eventually go towards Bran/Sansa.
https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/6oh3bk/spoilers_extended_something_about_jon_and_sansa/
For anyone who care enough to have a read, this is near the top of r/asoiaf. The 'Jon undead/deserter/King' thing bugged more than a few people in there.
I have said what I had to say regarding the whole thing, and fishy further elaborated. This is just to show it's far from some lonely man's crusade but a criticism quite a lot of book readers are leveling at the show.
For anyone who care enough to have a read, this is near the top of r/asoiaf. The 'Jon undead/deserter/King' thing bugged more than a few people in there.
I have said what I had to say regarding the whole thing, and fishy further elaborated. This is just to show it's far from some lonely man's crusade but a criticism quite a lot of book readers are leveling at the show.
To be fair, in that thread the main complaint isn't that he's a bastard King, but more so that his resurrection seems to have just been forgotten about.
Which I'd actually agree is a valid complaint. In episode 3 when it happened last season it rightfully felt like a massive fecking deal, but since then it's just kind of been glossed over in spite of how significant it should be.
My original comment started with the whole him being undead deserter and a bastard. People like to pick on the latter but it was made clear that in ASOIAF universe there's no precedent for that.
The criticism here isn't that he was made KitN. He'd have been that or something close in Winds anyway, but that the execution sucks mammoth's balls. The characters don't have access to the same amount of info we the viewers do so it's just strange they'd accept everything when a guy rocks up and say 'hey I died but was brought back, so it's cool I'm no longer LC of the NW', then moved from that to KitN chanting mode after a rousing speech by a little girl when by all laws and customs his sister sitting besides him there is their rightful liege. It doesn't make sense.
I consider this the TV equivalence of Kingdom of Heaven's logic. I seriously got triggered when Orlando Bloom made his little speech about Jerusalem being a place of worship for all faith to the Christian defenders. Very politically correct, very noble sentiment but IT DOESNT feckING WORK from a historical pov. If you hold that view in the 11th century you best keep it to yourself or your arse gonna get skewered.
Almost finished my second reading of ASOS. Man, what a great fecking character Jaime Lannister is. Easily my favourite POV in this book and possibly throughout (though it's hard to beat Tyrion in ACOK).
What an awful mess of him the show has made.
What an awful mess of him the show has made.
How bad a mess is it? He is still one of the better characters for me, his scene with the Tully guy was brilliant and he's had a few others.
They've totally fecked his relationship with Cersei since his initial return to KL. And sent him on a pointless, lame, season long mission to Dorne.
Agree his Riverrun story in the last season was an improvement, but seems it's back to square one with Cersei judging by the last episode.
I still think they'll do his eventual alienation from Cersei but it's lost all momentum considering it should've really happened the moment he arrives back at King's Landing. Being honest...I don't think the haircut helped his whole look either, as daft as it sounds. Best character in the books but to be honest a fair few characters have stagnated in the show.
I think the haircut was badly needed actually. I mean, he was literally...
with it.
with it.
I find it hard to believe people are comparing the rise to power of Jon in the North and the Powerpuff Girls in Dorne with kings and queens who took their thrones though conquest etc..
With regards Jaime his in show problem is he got home too soon and the writers literally had nothing for him to do. Such a big actor needs use so they sent himself and Bronn to Dorne for comic relief.
With regards Jaime his in show problem is he got home too soon and the writers literally had nothing for him to do. Such a big actor needs use so they sent himself and Bronn to Dorne for comic relief.
The two imbeciles's excuse to the Dorne plotline is that they envision it to be their favourite place, the Brazil of Westeros (hence the 'bad pussay' line), and Ellaria Sands were changed into a murderous bitch because they love her angry facial expression.
I shit you not, this really happened. Yet people seem to think there's method in the madness.
If they were determined to include Dorne, they really should have stuck to the books and based it around Arianne, a genuinely interesting female character with a bit of depth to her. Her relationship with her father and the secrets he eventually reveals would have made for something engaging at least. Instead they fell for the shallow option of using the sand snakes as some kind of weird bad-ass funky girl power commando squad, and it flunked miserably.
@InfiniteBoredom - I agree, I can't believe what they did to Dorne.
I quite like the show in general but honestly Dorne was a waste, when they hired a good actor to play Doran I was excited but that quickly got crushed. In the books we still dont know Dorans end game and he was seen as cunning/clever and playing the long game in spite of looking weak.
It seemed to me to be a way to cash in on Pedro (who strangely they got right).
One of the shows two lowest points, the other being Ramsey's 20 Black Ops causing Mel and Stannis to cook Shireen.
I quite like the show in general but honestly Dorne was a waste, when they hired a good actor to play Doran I was excited but that quickly got crushed. In the books we still dont know Dorans end game and he was seen as cunning/clever and playing the long game in spite of looking weak.
It seemed to me to be a way to cash in on Pedro (who strangely they got right).
One of the shows two lowest points, the other being Ramsey's 20 Black Ops causing Mel and Stannis to cook Shireen.
Ramsey was a bit silly in general.
He was a bit of a cartoon character.
He was a bit of a cartoon character.
We were robbed of the Battle of Fire as well, because all the money needs to go into Hardhome and dragons flying by. Barristan Selmy offed by a slaver, feck me. Victarion, arguably the coolest to read in ADwD was cut out entirely as a result of the change.
And Stannis the Mannis. Stephen Dillane said he couldnt make sense of his character's actions at all. They never got his character, as evidenced by when asked about why they decided to kill him off that way, they supplied 'ambition'. No you idiots, Stannis's character is all about duty. He hates the idea of being King, but feels entitled to it. It was never about 'wanting'.
Cutting Arianne was inexcusable, IMO. She was literally the only interesting character in A Feast for Crows.
Definitely the show's two lowest points. Really, the entire fifth season was a waste (bar the battle), but thankfully, they managed to set things right again in the sixth season.
Weird that they didn't use Arianne. She's a schemer, beautiful and loves sex. That's pretty much the trifecta for HBO.
She wasn't murderous enough like Buttercup, Blossom and Bubbles. As InfiniteBoredom said, D&D imagine Dornish people to have no brains, just drink, act hard, kiss each other with poison and come out with terrible one liners that would have been cheesy even in 80's action movies. Tell me when she stabbed Trystane through the back of the head and out through the eye you didn't expect her to say "He's always had his eye on my spear" or "Guess he didn't see that coming." Arianne is too clever for that so was cut.
Well tbf the only clever part of Arianne before the abduction was the hole between her legs (in true GRRM style)
Her character development was great to read though, quite a parallel with Alayne Stones.
What do we think the show will do with Littlefinger? With so few episodes left I'm trying to imagine how they will end so many individual stories and I find it hard to believe that Littlefinger doesn't have some trick up his sleeve or plan to seize more power for himself.
Noo, nooooo! I had forgotten that! The paaain
- Grabbing more power for himself has been what he has always been his stated plan.
Thanks. I will probably buy it. Need to read some new ASOIAF content now that Martin seems to have given up on the novels.