There's a chapter where Arya is escaping from the courtyard of Kings Landing after Syrio sends her away during the massacre of the North men. She's in the courtyard and there's this moment she hears a voice. On first read its easy to dismiss as he internal thoughts but reading back its extremely weirdly written as she reacts to this voice and looks around and there's noone there. "She had to leave now, she told herself, but when the moment came, she was too frightened to move. Calm as still water, a small voice whispered in her ear. Arya was so startled she almost dropped her bundle. She looked around wildly, but there was no one in the stable but her, and the horses, and the dead men. Quiet as a shadow, she heard. Was it her own voice, or Syrio's? She could not tell, yet somehow it calmed her fear." Always struck me as odd and a potential future Bran moment. No weirwood but apparently he'll eventually be able to go beyond the trees
I like the theory that Daemon ends up becoming a greenseer after falling into the gods eye and being taken to the isle of faces by the green men. It would serve as an interesting link between Bloodraven and whoever the previous greenseer was before him, which is currently unknown. The books/show have set up Daemon to be a possible greenseer candidate, his whole seemingly shoehorned Harrenhal weirwood plot in HotD season 2 would make complete sense of that’s the direction they’re going. It would also make sense for Daemon to be looking back at the events of the Dance and being the one who whispered ‘traitor’ to Alfred Broom, since he’s so personally connected to that moment. Although Bloodraven is the more likely possibility for who whispered in that moment, I’m still leaving the door open for it being Daemon until proved otherwise. I think it would be really cool and would add more depth to the magic and history of greenseers in ASoIaF.
@@pyramidion5911 100% agree, I loved every minute of those scenes. People complaining about that whole plot line don’t seem to be aware of all the implications and deep lore that is being expanded.
@@BitterSteel69 it just could’ve been done a lot better imo. You can have lore and character development without rehashing the same scenes over and over
@@gonx9906 that depends on what you mean by ‘no need’. It goes without saying that there were previous greenseers before Bloodraven. I’m not saying we need to go back all the way to the beginning of time, but having some indication of what the lineage is of greenseers in Westeros would be very fun to explore and provide richer world building. I don’t see what’s wrong with that. That’s like saying we don’t need to know about the dance of the dragons or Aegon’s prophecy because Dany already has dragons and fulfills the prophecy in the future. The magic of the weirwoods and the greenseers is some of, if not the most interesting parts of the lore of ASoIaF, why wouldn’t you want to know more?
Comment from the beginning: I think HoD is portraying magic much better. It is still very subtle, but better executed than it was in GoT. Also, I really appreciate this Harranhal better. Instead of simply looking like the Ruins of Osgiliath in the Lord of the Rings, it looks like a ruined castle, but also a castle that is still partly habitable. There are simply run down sections, and there are ruined sections. And the addition of hearing the magic is genius.
This also happens in the 1st chapter where Jon asks bran, do you hear it and bran hears the winds through the trees then Jon finds Ghost. It also happens when Arya is trying to escape the courtyard in kings landing and needs to time her run, she hears the wind say her name so clear she jumps. Then again she hears when she's trying to escape harenhall.
And Michael, you are absolutely right in that this is in the text. This is what he wrote whether we really want to believe it or not. There is a ton of magic in these books-untapped, unrealized and unused but it is still THERE.
Howland Reed "Howling Reeds" (talking trees/plants with wind) I think its one of George's biggest secrets.... And maybe how howland never really existed
This is an amazing idea that I have never come across! Meera and Jojen were born to get Bran to the cave. And we have seen Bran at the Tower of Joy, where we are told Howland Reed was with Ned's party. I love this idea!
This makes sense. It makes me wonder if bloodraven had a mentor like he was to bran. It makes sense that someone (a past green seer, may have been his teacher). Also it’s very poetic that howland reed, the man responsible for saving Ned, is now taking instruction from Ned’s son. Such a cool theory!
@@yogadork_namaste This wouldn't surprise me. I keep thinking that Daemon will survive his fight with Aemond and will wash up on the Isle of Faces only to be sacrificed before a weirwood by the Green Men but I guess them turning him into the three eyed raven would work as well.
We also know that Bran has been or rather will be guiding characters in the past: Jon sees a tree with Bran's face talking to him while he's in Ghost's skin. (And the three-eyed crow is obviously Bran: Brynden denies being the crow from the dreams, Bran means crow, Bran gets a third eye from the crow, brynden only has one. Bran has a tree-dream (trees are used by Brynden) and it's interrupted by a crow dream, did Brynden interrupt himself. And when Brynden greets Bran he says he's been watching him, not that he's guided and trained him in his abilities, which the Crow did.)
Dude I'm right there with you. I cannot for the life of me understand why so many book fans are mad that hotd keeps highlighting the song of ice and fire. For those who have only seen the show yeah it would be annoying to be reminded of terrible ending to GoT, but book fans should know and realize that there are characters who will be able to see the future and try to affect the past. We even know from George that Aegons dream is Canon and obviously would have impacted the past majorly. I'm not entirely sure if every instance where Aegons dream is being recalled in hotd is Canon but it stands to reason like a game of telephone that the meaning of Aegons dream would change over time. Now I'm not sure so much emphasis should be placed on the catspaw dagger, especially when it's part of a seemingly underwhelming mystery from the book and the Canon shattering effect it had in GoT, but it's just world building as I see it. Aegons dream even existing feels to me like they are pulling something straight from the books that wasn't in GoT (being the magical side of the story) which actually strengthens my faith in hotd rather than diminishing it. I swear so many of the fans see it, remember GoT and curse. I get it, but it's like they are remembering the wrong thing here.
Thank you! Saw Carmine and Preston of course hating on Daemon being guided by prophecy as if this isn’t standard fare for Targaryens. It’s a big echo of Rhaegar - “it seems I must be a warrior”. And Aegon, Aemon, Bloodraven, Jaehaerys II, etc.
Actually it's also said the children of the forest speak a different language than the common tongue and it sounds like wind in leaves or running water. I think there's a bunch of children of the forest in an underground root system using the trees and wells. They can pass under the wall and go between both sides of it. Interacting with all people.
I was about to say it could be Daemon himself if he survives by connecting to the heart trees on the isle of faces But it seems the isle's trees are disconnected from the rest of the network Bc I definitely think the green man was there, in part, to prepare the harrenhall tree to give Daemon the long term plan bc it's not something they could do remotely from the isle of faces
Daemon is the Trojan horse infiltrating the isle of faces on behalf of the Night Queen. The spirits that live in the dead trees have been trying to infiltrate the network of the living green trees. They can't cross whatever magical barrier , or wall, that is around the isle. That's why Daemon is lured down into the spirit world so he can crash down on the isle of faces, like a meteor. He is the corrupt intruder dipping into the pool of the pure. The shadow that was cast from the light. He brings the stink of death and his evil influence along with him into the realm of the living (These are all themes echoed over and over in the book)
I think Alys Rivers is the guardian and the one guiding Daemon to enlightenment. She is the guardian of the God's Eye, the protector of the innocent and those who can't fight for themselves. Harrenhall may be haunted but it only seems to destroy the unworthy, like Larys. Lynol and Harwin didn't go crazy. Simon hasn't gone mad. All Honorable men at heart. Daemon has potential and I think Alys seen that in him
I would say things might have already been affected (especially butterfly effect like) by the rustlings in the wind. But just like in the harry potter timetravel, they have already happened so you'd only be doing what fate has always needed you to do. You don't change the past. Ned had always heard something. Which would also kinda mean everything is predetermined because bran can't NOT go back in time and not be a whisper on the wind. Whoever said traitor could have been doing it from whenever and wherever if the trees allow for time travel. But i like this idea of closed loop time travel where you can't change the past because any changing would have already happened. But it does have big implications for free will of the characters. It kinda needs the future to be set in stone.
You are coming to the conclusions that some of the book characters might. But as a reader we get to step back and see with our own eyes that men do indeed have free will and it is the belief in destiny that chains us to one path.
I think time works almost like a sort of memory, that once an event has happened it’s over and you can’t change it but you can look at it and let it influence your future choices.
I think it's Daemon (as a future 3 Eyed Raven) saying traitor. Or it's whoever is the 3 Eyed Raven during the time Daemon is alive. We know Brynden Rivers didn't disappear ranging beyond the Wall til he was about 77 years old. And an old man is exactly what Bran sees in the visions when he sees the 3 Eyed Raven. But Daemon sees a YOUNG BloodRaven. Which means he's seeing his decendant as part of his own vision, not something being assisted by BloodRaven.
Bran's brother was the King in the North...what if Bran is the Prince that was Promised? To whom I am not sure, maybe to the Ones who Sing the Song of Earth...
Yesssssss. This. He’s proven he can’t be trusted. Not truly. It’s shown he has an agenda. And bran seems to be more powerful than him already. I think he doesn’t want to lose control of him just yet and he’s had an agenda for I mean how long now? Down to what a lot of people theorize using eugenics. And I’m on board with that theory.
Exactly. He’s not “wrong” about his powers, he’s lying to Bran. The Children are hiding something too. Why phrase it like “Don’t try to bring back the dead” unless it’s possible to bring back the dead? Instead you’d say “Don’t bother, it’s impossible. Try all you want it won’t work.”
I like the fact they are adding more magic in HoTD; however, I really dislike the idea of Bran/and or Bloodraven influencing events because they see the future or even changing the past. Takes away so much from the characters. Learning from the past is fine, time travel I would hate. But as you point out, looks like George really wants to go down that route. Probably one of the reasons Winds is taking so long.
Pretty much but less cringe lol. GRRM had a pretty good sci fi story back in the day about a pretty unattractive guy who would send his consciousness back in time to avoid a major conflict. It's how he attempts to avoid the time travel paradox's because even though technically the time traveler would never exist his consciousness still does in the new timeline similar to steins;gate. (Steins;gate does it better than him lol)
Daemon walked Broome all the way to THAT tree for a reason. You cannot lie in front of a Heart Tree/Godswood. Now-when Bran puts his hand on the tree, he is bringing the trees further into the future from the time when touches the Tree. It isn't Time Travel-but it does not have bounds within the trees. The seed remembers..the root, the branch the trunk...now the trees can see into the past AND the future...but the future is uncertain and limited as it has not happened AND has only been seen through a few people who have..hmm, what is a good word for it here? Downloaded? Once you touch a tree-it downloads info into it. Damnit I can say this lol-this reads crazy but I swear it does make sense. I just can't type as well as I speak. In Arya chapter from ACOK-they bury the 'Please' Woman..and in the wind, Arya can still hear her whimpering and whispering 'Please' on the wind. The leaves of the trees are tiny red hands that grab at people when they ride by in text as well. The Trees are Alive and they can talk to each other and pass info. The THING I want to know most is...WHY can't Bran even TRY to being someone back from death? WHY did Leaf/Blood Raven say it like THAT? Someone has tried to do it, THAT is why. Someone has went into the Trees to look for someone dead they loved to bring back to LIFE and it REALLY caused some damaged. I am guessing THIS is HOW The Others came into existence in THIS world of ASOIAF...someone couldn't let go of someone who died that they loved and so they go into Death Itself to bring them back. Side-note-keep in mind that in text, there are characters who are SMOKING weirwood leaves. They smoke Various Smokes...hmm. And look at those leaves anyways-Maple. Weirwood sap is corrupted maple syrup, innit? Wonder what happens to people when they EAT, SMOKE or otherwise ingest Weirwood leaves, syrup, paste etc.? In text, characters do exactly THIS to look for 'cures' to things like The Shivers. Winter Sickness, etc. They even drink straight up blood...hmm. yeah. I could go on but these trees..they be doing some REAL crazy shit.
When you say 'go into Death' it might be the heart of winter. Bran sees it when he is close to dying. The Others might all be failed resurrections and Bran might make the same mistake trying to save Jon.
Most writers pass before accomplishing such an advanced universe. I think you are speaking like a spoiled person who thinks the world is easily adjusted with the snap of a finger. I'm just being honest.
@@WileCoyoteMoncure-Smith Oh, I love this franchise to death, don’t get me wrong. But I can’t give him a pass when he strongly opposes that showrunners change from source material when he doesn’t give us concrete source material. Not to mention that he doesn’t authorize or prepare anyone to finish it in case he passes, meaning that ASOIAF is at most 10 years away from being the biggest letdown in literature and from canonizing the biggest letdown in tv show history that was GoT seasons 7-8. I love the man and his fictional world, but I’m sure you understand how frustrating this is after waiting for 13 years and seeing him put out other amazing content since.
@@BCrane-ej4iq I hope that he changes his mind and let someone writes it after he passes because I don’t think we’re going to get winds or dream. I mean hell Herbert died before Dune series was completed and his family took over(I’m not fond of a lot of the stuff Brian has written, but I understand why especially after almost didn’t get “ Messiah” even published and his work was so misunderstood that the family would not trust anyone else with his work since they have his notes and know the man and would truly understand his universe so well) The same thing happened with the girl with the Dragon tattoo series. His domestic partner had all the notes and if I’m remembering correctly, he wanted her to finish and the estate wouldn’t allow it so we got horrible sequels. But I do hope he passes on the information because obviously I want the main series finished above all, and I want fire and blood part two because he ended it on a bad ass note and the rest of dunk&egg because I’m so so curious about summer hall, which is why I want fire and blood part two. Because I’m curious about Alys rivers, aegon III reign with his brother and a ton of other stuff, but I want the main series 1st. I’m just glad we’re still getting quality content theory videos put out there still like this talking about the magic which is the most fascinating for me. There’s a recent (like two weeks ago maybe? Or a month) Reddit thread in r/asoiaf that address this topic. Essentially someone posted because they got sad because they were scrolling through and saw someone who was doing a reread, and then they were asking if there was anything they should be looking for in particular and how excited they were for this series and they were basically just wondering what happened to the person and then a lot of huge people from the community dropped off the map. I’m grateful for channels like this and radio Westeros, in deep geek, alt swift x, etc (and this channel obviously and soo many others, David lightbringer (I hope I got the channel name right just did a long video with all the magic systems) especially for keeping it going. But basically everyone had different feelings about it. Lots of anger, lots of sadness and a lot of disappointment. It was a mixed thread. No one chewed each other out or invalidated anyone’s opinions/feelings on it or their frustration . But essentially addressed why they agreed or disagreed like honestly it was pretty wholesome, even though it was really a sad thread. A lot of it circles back to what people believe the authors “owe” their fans. And there was a really good UA-cam short(probably on tiktok) about this and I was just scrolling but as soon as I heard that topic, I was like this is about thrones and sure enough it address thrones and only thrones. It was four different people within the fandom. I think the ultimate agreement was the author doesn’t owe the fans anything however I forget the way they worded it, but that wasn’t the actual conclusion. The actual conclusion was a little bit more complicated where it’s like technically, the author owes us nothing however, at the same time you’ve got a loyal base who support you and we would be happy if it was released and just even if it ended mid page, mid sentence just something (some people disagreed but 🤷🏻♀️) . It was just stated better. We aren’t entitled to anything. But it is frustrating as so many of us have put so much energy/money/time and we are paranoid it won’t happen now. Double edged sword. Excuse any typos. Neuropathy and talk to text hates me🥴.
@@BCrane-ej4iqand yes getting fire&blood which was amazing but I was like damn I was hoping to get winds first. But I was ecstatic for any content. Then it ended on an amazing cliffhanger and I was like well shit there goes another. I was so so grateful for the content but then now it’s like I wanted the main series finished but now I’m invested in this history book with unreliable narrators and it ended on a bad ass part where I was like YESSSS YOU GO KING!!! and I don’t think there will be a part two released.
I think a lot of the visions we see and hear about, are future or present people sending them, only for them to be misinterpreted by the receiver thanks to the symbolic nature of ASOIAF’s astral realm that the messages are sent from in the first place. It’s like trying to communicate via a game of charades in a foggy room while also building an ikea desk. 😅
Bloodraven said that they can't change the past, not that they can't be heard. It works with bill and ted rules, you can't change anything because you already did it.
Right? That’s one of my first theories that I had while reading the books. I know it’s popular but I was surprised that, when I finally got into reading other peoples thoughts about the series, it wasn’t discussed more and taken more seriously. It just didn’t make sense for the Bran that we are reading about in the books would be the same Bran we see whispering to people in their own point of view chapters. It always seemed like a future more educated and practiced Bran. And it would hold major implications for the story as a whole reaching back thousands of years before the book series even starts!
@@DNotzzBran isn't the only one hooked up to a tree. The spiders on the web eat the flies stuck to it and Bran is symbolically and literally trapped in the web. Spoiler Warning: Danny has been set up symbolically as a spider since the first line in her first chapter. It's Grrms first and most subtle warning that Danny is going to be the one to kill Bran and tend to the webs of the weirwoods.
I thought it was Damon’s own inner thought at first, like a remnant of one of his weir wood dreams but then when the other guy reacted to it I gave up that thought right away! They distracted me just like GRRM does in the books!
I have a small theory about weirwood communication. I wonder if Brean being a child slows him to figure out how to speak thru the trees. How he understands how to speak using wind and leaves as metaphor and whispers, and not directly speaking as himself. There seems to be a divide on when bran tries to communicate as himself and when he is just observing and he whispers a feeling to himself. Like ‘winter fell’ vs ‘father, it’s me bran!’ I feel like bloodraven is too self centered to try to communicate as something not himself, like he needs to be SEEN and you should know it’s HIM and he is IMPORTANT. Like ego prevents you from communicating directly. It would also kinda tie into Euron being a student but maybe he was too old so the three eyed crow tried a younger student. Just a silly thought but I hope it makes sense!
Children tha singers understand others speech is ice crackling sound.And of course Bloodraven is lying 2 him or just not telling till he is ready.thnx brada
I'm glad you said it could be Bloodraven because that was my assumption. I don't think this flies in the face of anything he told Bran when you consider Bloodraven would just dismiss it as impossible if he didn't succeed as much as he wanted. Even someone hearing the whisper, if they're dismissing it anyway, wouldn't be enough to count as a success. I'm betting we'll see this pay off in the Knight of the Seven Kingdoms show
I don't think you can exactly 'learn' to hear the old gods, I think you need to make a sacrifice. Theon can hear the tree because, like Bran, he has been close to death and lost a part of himself. Jojen gets green dreams after he is nearly killed by a fever and Jaime has a weirwood dream after he loses his hand. Theon has symbolically died and been reborn, he even looks like a ghost. The drumming is like shamanic drumming to bring him into the spirit world, the tree touches him with a bloody hand, and he thinks of sacrificing himself in front of the tree, which is what greenseers do and what Bloodraven has done to become part of the old gods.
The ordering of the scenes is what people are upset about. The daemon in harrenhall whole plot line was for him to have character growth and make his decision on whether to push himself as king, or rhanyra as queen. From a storytelling perspective, that last vision of saying "this is the future and you support rhanyra on the throne" takes the choice out of his hands, and in the end, he didnt choose for himself that rhanyra is the best person for the throne. If they had swapped some scenes around, such that he gets the vision after bending the knee, the arc would be nicely completed. It does just sit into the overall critique that hotd is very loosely string together between scenes. Daemon gathering big cheers for himself then pointng them to rhanyra doesnt follow from the episode before where Tully and the rivermen give their support to her, and begrudgingly dont kick daemon to the curb
Daemon didn't grow as a character, he was chopped down and hijacked just like the tree net. You are right about one thing though, his choice to support rhaenyra wasn't his own.
@@pyramidion5911except it was foreshadowed from the first season when he continued to serve and obey his brother over and over, despite serving himself and being disobedient over and over. When he was confronted and it matters then he’s always bent the knee and not tried to grasp the power he obviously wanted… Maybe it wasn’t his choice, alys is playing him and other big time, but like I said, clear foreshadowing allowed me to predict he would bend the knee and remain loyal to rhaenyra or house targ, or maybe loyal to the expectation of “his betters” or others.
If you pay attention to the words Bloodraven uses, he says the people he loved couldn’t hear him. Since Sir Alfred isn’t someone Bloodraven loves, it might be why he could hear “traitor” in the wind, but not Daemon.
I think BLOODRAVENs wrong that no one can hear..Like Others in the Fandom i believe BR has already tried this with Aerys The Mad King and his INFAMOUS LINE OF " BURN THEM ALL"" ..I think BR tried to tell The Mad King about " The coming of the Long Nightv2.0..And It drove Aerys MAD😂 but thats my take on why i think BR tells Bran that its a NO GO ZONE.cos of how wrong it went last time.or maybe a Thousand and....1 are wrong #If u know u know😂
I think BR was intentionally trying to get Bran to tamper with things because he is trying to lure out another figure in the net that attacks anyone who does just that.
There is another possibility. Daemon is the greenseer who calls the traitor a traitor. Daemon could learn this is possible bit dangerous, and thus bloodraven then chooses to tell bran it's not possible because he's not ready to have that kind of power. This is also possible without Daemon being a greenseer but I think he's most likely to be calling him a traitor. I also think daemon is clearly being set up as a greenseer figure. Alys fed him weirwood paste. He had lots of visions. Yada Yada. His visions are different than the kind bran has as his seem to be things from his past that haunt him whereas bran seems to see the objectively true past but who knows.
To speak to him in private,Daemon takes him straight to the Godswood, right in front of the weirwood, them almost smirks at his suggestion that WE NEED A KING...then tells him that he'd never giess him for a turn cloak.
People were getting upset because they want to make ASOIAF a hard magic system with rules like Harry Potter or DnD. Dragon Dreams are X & only Targs can have them & they are X only & from X source. Greenseers are Y & they work this other way & the source is Y only. You need glass candles for long distance communication, wargs are Z with Z powers, etc. I don't think the magic is that predictable & formulaic in ASOIAF & you are always dealing with unreliable narrators & POVs with diff agendas like the Maesters. So why couldn't Daemon have weirwood visions at Harranhal? Why couldn't Helaena have the ability to communicate via visions as well as have Dragon Dreams of the future? I enjoyed the magic fantastical touches they added to HotD otherwise it's just a medieval political drama & I can watch a show about The Medici, Borgias or Tudors for that :) The original GOTs series eliminated most of the magic & magical characters from the show, I'm glad they added that subtext back in with HotD. It is supposed to be a fantasy story...
Using what you said about how many times GRRM uses “the words are wind” : “The Winds of Winter” becomes “The Words of Winter” Most likely a coincidence, but it does invite some deeper thought into the meaning of the title
Bran and Bloodraven either have access to the knowledge of all the previous Greenseers (some of whom are "alive" via the trees Or they share consciousness with them, they are kind of multiple minds in one or two bodies. So is it Bran "Bran" or "Bran Plus" communicating with Theon?
Alot of characters hear the wind or look at the moon right before important things happen....Jon hears a voice when he finds Ghost and Arya does too a few times, Breanna and Catlin...it's all over the place in ASOIF
I think The Blood Raven is trying to spare Bran the pain of not being able to change the past. The Raven has spent thousands of years longing for his family and trying to change bad things that has happened to them. His words may be heard but those hearing have no understanding of what is said. Even if it were understood, like what Halaena said, "It won't change a thing." Halaena understands but knows what has been and what will be can't be changed.
Another thing of note, there is litterally a town in the Summer Isles known as Talking Trees Town. So, yeah. Maybe someone there knows enough to listen.
I'm inclined to believe this is all Bran. He's setting up the world to be as he remembers it so that he can manipulate Bloodraven into coming north to send messages to his younger self to come north to meet Bloodraven and learn about his abilities and then set up the to be as he remembers it. Think Eren Jaegar except no giant naked giants.
If winds = words, then The Winds of Winter would mean the Words of Winter, potentially foreshadowing that the characters are literally going to hear the words of and communicate with winter itself. IMO this means that there will be some communication with the Others at some point in the future.
A complex topic. Can you hear the Old Gods? I thing I've suspected is that part of BR's (I'll give him some rope) misunderstanding, it there are requirements. Perhaps whatever can give you the ability to skin change can also make you capable of hearing the voices. BR frames it as a failing or limit of greenseer and doesn't seem to consider it's a limit of the reciever. Ned hearing Bran could be because he can, not because Bran can make him hear. People who can hear (book wise) also tend to he broken in some way. They've reached a point they deeply question themselves rather than firmly standing on strong beliefs. Is it BR? Perhaps. This is an interesting number of theories to draw from. Some people even believe Nettles was preparing Daemon to be a greenseer as we and imagine he ended up beneath Harrenhall on a throne. In which case it could be Daemon talking to his own past. The possibilities of this topic open up considerably when you consider the name of the next book. If "words are wind" then what are the "winds of winter?" There's a bit of a logic gap, imho, when people consider the nature of winter and the Old Gods. Something I think you should consider. The Kight of the Laughing tree. Strip back to the symbolism of tree with a booming voice. See it not as a knight, but as the embodiment of a tree rescuing Howland.
The one thing that gets me about some of the Bran theories, is that they give him too much power. He's the only one going back in time, clearly teaching multiple things he has no knowledge of ( like architecture), and manipulating everything, because he's an extra special superhuman person with extra special skills and abilities. In the theories i like the least, he has the ability to try things over and over and keep tweaking things. He can't make a mistake because he can just do over.. It just doesn't feel right to me that one character has all the narrative weight. If everyone is just a pawn what is even the point. I like the idea that there are several people with overlapping and conflicting goals. Just because Bloodraven can't do it, doesn't mean any of the others who have been greenseers over thousands and thousands of years can't. I have a feeling that it's more like, the longer you're connected to the weirwoods, the less connected/interested in the world you are. So in the present, Bran connects to the people he knows - Ned, Theon, as well as a random selection from the past. In the times of HOTD, it's someone who has connection to those characters - be that Bloodraven, or Dameon in the future, or some unknown character that is kinda pissed that someone's trying to get Dameon back on a bad path after all that therapy work.
The easiest thing to do is make Bran talk with Brandon the Builder,we´ll get to see the origins of everything and a way to revert whatever happened ind the past, maybe as a "surprise" we learn that the forest kids fucked up something very important. Also you could throw some time travel shenanigans with the idea that the talk with someone from the future made Brandon choose the words of his house.
Well technically Bran can have all of the special powers in the world and it wouldn't matter because all greenseers are ultimately powerless. As the future is predetermined There is no prophecy that has gone wrong yet and we know that the Hodor reveal came from George. In a predetermined time travel scenario, it doesn't matter how much power the greenseers really have. They can't change the past.
I’ve argued: (1( Theon is a greenseer himself. He dreams of the feast of the dead at Winterfell with Robb there. (2) Quite likely Euron Greyjoy’s bastard son. Since Euron slept with one of his brother’s sons, he probably would have tried w others too. This creates a powerful symmetry among all three of the oldest boys raised at Winterfell if Jon is secretly Rhaegar’s son, Theon is secretly Euron’s son, and Robb Stark is secretly Brandon Stark’s son because Brandon slept with his fiancée Catelyn before going off to challenge Rhaegar in King’s Landing. Note that the scene you quote with Ned praying for Robb and Jon to grow up like brothers has an even deeper meaning if one is his sister’s son and the other is his brother’s son, both of which he is falsely claiming as his sons for their own benefit. In any case, Theon being Euron’s son makes sense next to Jon as Rhaegar’s son and Bran as Ned’s son for story purposes. (3) Theon can hear Bran talking to him because he is this powerful greenseer himself, without knowing it yet, Euron’s son. (4) Symbolically, and magically, Theon is slowly becoming a weirwood. He’s undergoing the transformation, and eventually he will switch places with Bran and hook into a weirwood instead of Bran: Theon has gone bone white in his skin and hair, like a weirwood. He’s lost fingers and toes, like every tree loses certain branches and roots as it grows. He’s lost his original identity. He was imprisoned under the Dreadfort in a completely dark cell and nearly starved like a greenseer hooked into the roots of a weirwood, as Bloodraven wants Bran to do. (5) Theon is probably a symbolic parallel to the original Blackwood heart trees being infected at some point by a pathogen from a comet from outer space and turning bone white, losing their color and original identity, and becoming this alien hive mind organism. (6) Theon is a Greek name literally meaning “with God” and I believe it’s used in the opening sentence of the Gospel of John because the Word was “with God / Theon.” Thus even his name implies that he is going eventually to become a God tree and that his transformation from Theon to Reek parallels a corruption of The One original God tree / heart tree into an undead fungus organism that has spread all over Westeros to be worshipped by men whom it effectively enslaves now. Jeff, A Theory of Ice & Fire on Quora
Point 5 is interesting. Reminds me of what happened to the American Chestnut Trees. An invasive species of parasitic fungus was brought over with Japanese Cherry Blossoms that wiped out all the American Chestnut Trees. The Blight. It would turn the trees white as it spread.
Grrm loved taking real world inspiration for his stories and threading them in seamlessly I really think you are spot on with this I never even considered Robb actually being Brandon’s son and them both being cousins to bran
Clearly there has to be a mistake made by bloodraven that may have messed up the timeline for a song of ice and fire, we should see sometime in the series how bloodraven knows that messing with the past will change the future for worse. The past is already written, the ink is dry
You said that the old gods were people communicating with people... It makes sense. It's not really a new idea. legends talk about ancestors and the dead, who are part of the pantheon of gods, or later in various forms they can communicate with people. Today many people follow a similar mythology. Catholicism believes that if a person was good, they went to heaven. You can pray to him, and he listens to you. Additionally, there are all kinds of organizations such as the Jesuits, who take care of the spread of this religion, as well as spiritual ones, who can communicate with the spirits of the dead and pass on information. For example, knowledge of who is supposedly in purgatory or not. George could have weaved this into the books. Trees as relics hold the dead, and goodness can flow through them. You can pray to relics, like to weirwood trees. Additionally, there are many who talk about possessions - a more aggressive version of what the is found in Stark kids and what they can do. Bran can even possess a person. it seems so simulator. This would also explain why trees are corrupted... Like the reformation that shook Catholicism... like the night king almost shook the old ways.... Maybe more like Huss. And now there is a chance for the reformation of the old ways. And the knowledge of how to do it will be in Bran, the main characters will do it, and the Isle of faces will have the resources to cleanse the corruption of green magic or something like that. others can also be a reference to another faith, or different beliefs in the same category. The wife of the night king showed him: Listen, this is not like that, this is strange what they do, it's not right. that's why they scare people with Stories about them, and of the long night of darkness just like the dark ages- it is the corrupt form of green magic that is responsible and others might be just like another civilization, that has ice magic. Like green people would have green magic. The others might also be a other way of thinking about old ways, or a system. For example, catholic priest do study ancient philosophy for example greek right. So green magic, that has Build the wall and that has created others to destroy humans is a version of like... adopting life force ( green ) with destroying powers ( ice ), so the good stuff is corrupt, needs blood, and Ring women in their wedding night and kiļļīñğ babies. And Bran or the guys in the system realized that it is sick, so they need another destroying force ( fire ) that won with Roynar ( water, water that gives life, is life. Without it nothing can grow). So the plan is to let ice and fire clash, and by making that war, green magic can be brought back and the fire magic will not be sustained because of lack of the dragons, they will die in future anyway. So a power vacuum will be replace with water magic maybe... Like Dorn has that blood that lost to Valyriaz but then resisted Agon's line. Then they married water to fire and only suffered after. And also live in a desert more or less... a desert is a sort of corruption of fertility, that green magic is known for, and would maybe spown, or as it will grow stronger because off the combined actions of Bran, Isle of faces, green man, and other hearos will spown also water magic, so the song of Ice and fire ( after ice, snow and winter comes spring with grass and melted snow- water that will be made because of the battle with ice and fire, though in a more human- way) will start a new song, a song of grass and water tha can and will prosper together and not be destroying one another. Sort of like a battle of faith. After reforming it, something different will take it's place, something that will not be corrupted by it's predecessor. And it might be so that green magic will prosper in Westeros, and water magic will take over Esos, and/ or Dorne makin that land green and full of water. And by magic I mean the new way of look at thing also. And Bran will be the on, to tell someone that remembers and mises the opd ways and would like to go back to the old ways like... no, it's fine now, that and that happend, becouse of that and that. We are good now. I don't know. It might be a fan fiction at that point but, someone would maybe be able to take some peace and make a nice video about it :)
I think it's not explicitly *just* the ability of the particular greenseer, whether Bran or Bloodraven or someone else, but also the abilities of the person who is on the receiving end -- Bloodraven may tell Bran "no word of mine has ever reached them" *because he was attempting to speak to people who could not understand tree-language* and so from his perspective it felt like every attempt at communication failed... aaaaaand I was about to say "but there is someone in lore who CAN speak to trees"... and then I decided to check ahead in the video and saw Howland Reed's face, I think you and I went to the same place with that thought xD
"Hey wanna come to my betrayal party?"
"Let me ask the wind... The wind said no."
There's a chapter where Arya is escaping from the courtyard of Kings Landing after Syrio sends her away during the massacre of the North men. She's in the courtyard and there's this moment she hears a voice. On first read its easy to dismiss as he internal thoughts but reading back its extremely weirdly written as she reacts to this voice and looks around and there's noone there.
"She had to leave now, she told herself, but when the moment came, she was too frightened to move.
Calm as still water, a small voice whispered in her ear. Arya was so startled she almost dropped her bundle. She looked around wildly, but there was no one in the stable but her, and the horses, and the dead men.
Quiet as a shadow, she heard. Was it her own voice, or Syrio's? She could not tell, yet somehow it calmed her fear."
Always struck me as odd and a potential future Bran moment. No weirwood but apparently he'll eventually be able to go beyond the trees
16:42 The gods wood possibly attempting to produce the prince that was promised reminds me of the Bene Gesserit from Dune.
Your channel will hit 100k in no time. Constructive advice: I’d recommend a mic upgrade so your voice sounds warmer/bassier.
I like the theory that Daemon ends up becoming a greenseer after falling into the gods eye and being taken to the isle of faces by the green men. It would serve as an interesting link between Bloodraven and whoever the previous greenseer was before him, which is currently unknown. The books/show have set up Daemon to be a possible greenseer candidate, his whole seemingly shoehorned Harrenhal weirwood plot in HotD season 2 would make complete sense of that’s the direction they’re going. It would also make sense for Daemon to be looking back at the events of the Dance and being the one who whispered ‘traitor’ to Alfred Broom, since he’s so personally connected to that moment. Although Bloodraven is the more likely possibility for who whispered in that moment, I’m still leaving the door open for it being Daemon until proved otherwise. I think it would be really cool and would add more depth to the magic and history of greenseers in ASoIaF.
I've been saying it the whole time, Daemons "side quest" is actually the juiciest morsel of main story we have been served on screen so far.
@@pyramidion5911 100% agree, I loved every minute of those scenes. People complaining about that whole plot line don’t seem to be aware of all the implications and deep lore that is being expanded.
@@BitterSteel69 it just could’ve been done a lot better imo. You can have lore and character development without rehashing the same scenes over and over
There is no need of a previous three eyed crow if both brynden and Bran can look into the past.
@@gonx9906 that depends on what you mean by ‘no need’. It goes without saying that there were previous greenseers before Bloodraven. I’m not saying we need to go back all the way to the beginning of time, but having some indication of what the lineage is of greenseers in Westeros would be very fun to explore and provide richer world building. I don’t see what’s wrong with that. That’s like saying we don’t need to know about the dance of the dragons or Aegon’s prophecy because Dany already has dragons and fulfills the prophecy in the future. The magic of the weirwoods and the greenseers is some of, if not the most interesting parts of the lore of ASoIaF, why wouldn’t you want to know more?
Comment from the beginning: I think HoD is portraying magic much better. It is still very subtle, but better executed than it was in GoT. Also, I really appreciate this Harranhal better. Instead of simply looking like the Ruins of Osgiliath in the Lord of the Rings, it looks like a ruined castle, but also a castle that is still partly habitable. There are simply run down sections, and there are ruined sections. And the addition of hearing the magic is genius.
This also happens in the 1st chapter where Jon asks bran, do you hear it and bran hears the winds through the trees then Jon finds Ghost. It also happens when Arya is trying to escape the courtyard in kings landing and needs to time her run, she hears the wind say her name so clear she jumps. Then again she hears when she's trying to escape harenhall.
Gives the saying, “Words are wind” a whole new meaning.
And Michael, you are absolutely right in that this is in the text. This is what he wrote whether we really want to believe it or not. There is a ton of magic in these books-untapped, unrealized and unused but it is still THERE.
Jaehaerys said: "Words are wind,[...] but wind can fan a fire."
I think the whisper in hotd has no reason to be coming from anyone other than bloodraven, we literally see the guy
Yea, plus the word “ traitor” kinda implies that the person speaking it holds some sort of allegiance to one side over the other
I think it someone closer to the story of hotd...Helena , Alys or Future Daemon for example.
@@tinahs8269Daemon as a tree king in the future, thinking slow tree thoughts, just like Bran.
Bloodraven is the only person in all the books that we 100% know can't affect the past though.
@@someguyoutthere110 but he may not think it is altering, he may not have noticed as the people in the situation heard the wind
Criminally underrated channel, love all the content
You are my favourite asoiaf youtuber on here istg
Howland Reed "Howling Reeds" (talking trees/plants with wind) I think its one of George's biggest secrets.... And maybe how howland never really existed
This is an amazing idea that I have never come across! Meera and Jojen were born to get Bran to the cave. And we have seen Bran at the Tower of Joy, where we are told Howland Reed was with Ned's party.
I love this idea!
@@Traisas Absolutely! I think that is a major possibility that it is just "Bran" in the past; combined with "the Swamp Thing" from DC comics lol
This makes sense. It makes me wonder if bloodraven had a mentor like he was to bran. It makes sense that someone (a past green seer, may have been his teacher). Also it’s very poetic that howland reed, the man responsible for saving Ned, is now taking instruction from Ned’s son. Such a cool theory!
There's a theory that daemon targ is the greenseer before blood raven, we will see if that happens in house of the dragon.
@@yogadork_namaste This wouldn't surprise me. I keep thinking that Daemon will survive his fight with Aemond and will wash up on the Isle of Faces only to be sacrificed before a weirwood by the Green Men but I guess them turning him into the three eyed raven would work as well.
I love daemon's harrenhall arc!
your analysis makes me rethink what the title Winds of Winter could possibly mean, maybe a double meeting?
Grrm is into multiple meanings with no limit
@@pyramidion5911 lol so true.. this is what makes GoT so incredible!
Your videos and theories are superb, excellent work man
We also know that Bran has been or rather will be guiding characters in the past: Jon sees a tree with Bran's face talking to him while he's in Ghost's skin.
(And the three-eyed crow is obviously Bran: Brynden denies being the crow from the dreams, Bran means crow, Bran gets a third eye from the crow, brynden only has one. Bran has a tree-dream (trees are used by Brynden) and it's interrupted by a crow dream, did Brynden interrupt himself. And when Brynden greets Bran he says he's been watching him, not that he's guided and trained him in his abilities, which the Crow did.)
100% all of this. I also think future Bran is the 3-eyed crow!
@@Traisas Yeah I'm almost certain. I'm certain it isn't Brynden because he only has one eye.
Which book does the dream interruption happen in?
@@rhinoceros2469 It's in Clash of Kings Bran V.
@@psevdhome thanks
Dude I'm right there with you. I cannot for the life of me understand why so many book fans are mad that hotd keeps highlighting the song of ice and fire. For those who have only seen the show yeah it would be annoying to be reminded of terrible ending to GoT, but book fans should know and realize that there are characters who will be able to see the future and try to affect the past. We even know from George that Aegons dream is Canon and obviously would have impacted the past majorly. I'm not entirely sure if every instance where Aegons dream is being recalled in hotd is Canon but it stands to reason like a game of telephone that the meaning of Aegons dream would change over time. Now I'm not sure so much emphasis should be placed on the catspaw dagger, especially when it's part of a seemingly underwhelming mystery from the book and the Canon shattering effect it had in GoT, but it's just world building as I see it. Aegons dream even existing feels to me like they are pulling something straight from the books that wasn't in GoT (being the magical side of the story) which actually strengthens my faith in hotd rather than diminishing it. I swear so many of the fans see it, remember GoT and curse. I get it, but it's like they are remembering the wrong thing here.
Thank you! Saw Carmine and Preston of course hating on Daemon being guided by prophecy as if this isn’t standard fare for Targaryens. It’s a big echo of Rhaegar - “it seems I must be a warrior”. And Aegon, Aemon, Bloodraven, Jaehaerys II, etc.
I think it's Daemon. His body is never recovered and he could be hooked up to the Weirwood net at the Gods Eye
Hey havent left a comment in a while. Been liking them though. The whole wind talking thing, I LOVE!!! I LOVE WHISPERS ON THE WINDS
Bro you're always on point
So excited to get another video from you! Thanks
The very image of Daemon of all people having a magic apprentice he needs to teach very important things to is so funny to me😭
Poor Brynden
Actually it's also said the children of the forest speak a different language than the common tongue and it sounds like wind in leaves or running water. I think there's a bunch of children of the forest in an underground root system using the trees and wells. They can pass under the wall and go between both sides of it. Interacting with all people.
I was about to say it could be Daemon himself if he survives by connecting to the heart trees on the isle of faces
But it seems the isle's trees are disconnected from the rest of the network
Bc I definitely think the green man was there, in part, to prepare the harrenhall tree to give Daemon the long term plan bc it's not something they could do remotely from the isle of faces
Daemon is the Trojan horse infiltrating the isle of faces on behalf of the Night Queen. The spirits that live in the dead trees have been trying to infiltrate the network of the living green trees. They can't cross whatever magical barrier , or wall, that is around the isle. That's why Daemon is lured down into the spirit world so he can crash down on the isle of faces, like a meteor. He is the corrupt intruder dipping into the pool of the pure. The shadow that was cast from the light. He brings the stink of death and his evil influence along with him into the realm of the living (These are all themes echoed over and over in the book)
I think Alys Rivers is the guardian and the one guiding Daemon to enlightenment. She is the guardian of the God's Eye, the protector of the innocent and those who can't fight for themselves. Harrenhall may be haunted but it only seems to destroy the unworthy, like Larys. Lynol and Harwin didn't go crazy. Simon hasn't gone mad. All Honorable men at heart. Daemon has potential and I think Alys seen that in him
I would say things might have already been affected (especially butterfly effect like) by the rustlings in the wind. But just like in the harry potter timetravel, they have already happened so you'd only be doing what fate has always needed you to do. You don't change the past. Ned had always heard something. Which would also kinda mean everything is predetermined because bran can't NOT go back in time and not be a whisper on the wind. Whoever said traitor could have been doing it from whenever and wherever if the trees allow for time travel.
But i like this idea of closed loop time travel where you can't change the past because any changing would have already happened. But it does have big implications for free will of the characters. It kinda needs the future to be set in stone.
This is the obvious conclusion. Bloodraven probably realizes this and is trying to squash Brans excitement
You are coming to the conclusions that some of the book characters might. But as a reader we get to step back and see with our own eyes that men do indeed have free will and it is the belief in destiny that chains us to one path.
I think time works almost like a sort of memory, that once an event has happened it’s over and you can’t change it but you can look at it and let it influence your future choices.
Bran might be more powerful than Bloodraven, and might not know it.
Bran is coming into his power at a time of rising magic.
18:38 what if those clip-clopping sounds are the guy banging coconuts together. Cocnuts do migrate afterall.
Best insight! Thank you Michael talks about stuff
I think it's Daemon (as a future 3 Eyed Raven) saying traitor. Or it's whoever is the 3 Eyed Raven during the time Daemon is alive.
We know Brynden Rivers didn't disappear ranging beyond the Wall til he was about 77 years old. And an old man is exactly what Bran sees in the visions when he sees the 3 Eyed Raven.
But Daemon sees a YOUNG BloodRaven. Which means he's seeing his decendant as part of his own vision, not something being assisted by BloodRaven.
Words are wind!
💨💨💨
Bran's brother was the King in the North...what if Bran is the Prince that was Promised?
To whom I am not sure, maybe to the Ones who Sing the Song of Earth...
You failed to suggest that Bloodraven is more than likely lying to Bran when he says not to try. He is not to be trusted on all counts
Yesssssss. This. He’s proven he can’t be trusted. Not truly. It’s shown he has an agenda. And bran seems to be more powerful than him already. I think he doesn’t want to lose control of him just yet and he’s had an agenda for I mean how long now? Down to what a lot of people theorize using eugenics. And I’m on board with that theory.
Exactly. He’s not “wrong” about his powers, he’s lying to Bran. The Children are hiding something too. Why phrase it like “Don’t try to bring back the dead” unless it’s possible to bring back the dead? Instead you’d say “Don’t bother, it’s impossible. Try all you want it won’t work.”
Thank u hotd for implementing some of this stuff!!!! Great vid🤝
Words not reaching someome can be taken as not understanding vs simply hearing
I like the fact they are adding more magic in HoTD; however, I really dislike the idea of Bran/and or Bloodraven influencing events because they see the future or even changing the past. Takes away so much from the characters. Learning from the past is fine, time travel I would hate. But as you point out, looks like George really wants to go down that route. Probably one of the reasons Winds is taking so long.
Really interesting and I love your content!
Dude I love your channel ❤❤❤❤ keep up the GOOD WORK!!
I am not convinced that time travel happens in the forward direction - at least I am not convinced YET.
So... Bran is Eren Yeager?
And he could create a "rumbling" with skinchanging and weirwood trees?
Pretty much but less cringe lol. GRRM had a pretty good sci fi story back in the day about a pretty unattractive guy who would send his consciousness back in time to avoid a major conflict. It's how he attempts to avoid the time travel paradox's because even though technically the time traveler would never exist his consciousness still does in the new timeline similar to steins;gate. (Steins;gate does it better than him lol)
The symbolism overlaps really well. Even the pathways being tree roots fits perfectly.
@@pokeman5000 Attack on Titan is everything George wishes his story was lol
Technically Eren is Bran. ASOIAF came first... so all this time it's Bran whispering "Tatakae" in our green-eyed devil's head
Daemon walked Broome all the way to THAT tree for a reason. You cannot lie in front of a Heart Tree/Godswood. Now-when Bran puts his hand on the tree, he is bringing the trees further into the future from the time when touches the Tree. It isn't Time Travel-but it does not have bounds within the trees. The seed remembers..the root, the branch the trunk...now the trees can see into the past AND the future...but the future is uncertain and limited as it has not happened AND has only been seen through a few people who have..hmm, what is a good word for it here? Downloaded? Once you touch a tree-it downloads info into it. Damnit I can say this lol-this reads crazy but I swear it does make sense. I just can't type as well as I speak. In Arya chapter from ACOK-they bury the 'Please' Woman..and in the wind, Arya can still hear her whimpering and whispering 'Please' on the wind. The leaves of the trees are tiny red hands that grab at people when they ride by in text as well. The Trees are Alive and they can talk to each other and pass info. The THING I want to know most is...WHY can't Bran even TRY to being someone back from death? WHY did Leaf/Blood Raven say it like THAT? Someone has tried to do it, THAT is why. Someone has went into the Trees to look for someone dead they loved to bring back to LIFE and it REALLY caused some damaged. I am guessing THIS is HOW The Others came into existence in THIS world of ASOIAF...someone couldn't let go of someone who died that they loved and so they go into Death Itself to bring them back. Side-note-keep in mind that in text, there are characters who are SMOKING weirwood leaves. They smoke Various Smokes...hmm. And look at those leaves anyways-Maple. Weirwood sap is corrupted maple syrup, innit? Wonder what happens to people when they EAT, SMOKE or otherwise ingest Weirwood leaves, syrup, paste etc.? In text, characters do exactly THIS to look for 'cures' to things like The Shivers. Winter Sickness, etc. They even drink straight up blood...hmm. yeah. I could go on but these trees..they be doing some REAL crazy shit.
I was thinking man this guy really gets it, then I read the username and it all made sense 😂 on point as always April 👌
@@pyramidion5911 Awww...thanks! And hey! Hellos, nice to e-see you!
When you say 'go into Death' it might be the heart of winter. Bran sees it when he is close to dying.
The Others might all be failed resurrections and Bran might make the same mistake trying to save Jon.
The Winds talk more than George writes them these days. The absolute state of this franchise.
Most writers pass before accomplishing such an advanced universe. I think you are speaking like a spoiled person who thinks the world is easily adjusted with the snap of a finger. I'm just being honest.
@@WileCoyoteMoncure-Smith Oh, I love this franchise to death, don’t get me wrong. But I can’t give him a pass when he strongly opposes that showrunners change from source material when he doesn’t give us concrete source material. Not to mention that he doesn’t authorize or prepare anyone to finish it in case he passes, meaning that ASOIAF is at most 10 years away from being the biggest letdown in literature and from canonizing the biggest letdown in tv show history that was GoT seasons 7-8. I love the man and his fictional world, but I’m sure you understand how frustrating this is after waiting for 13 years and seeing him put out other amazing content since.
@@BCrane-ej4iq I hope that he changes his mind and let someone writes it after he passes because I don’t think we’re going to get winds or dream. I mean hell Herbert died before Dune series was completed and his family took over(I’m not fond of a lot of the stuff Brian has written, but I understand why especially after almost didn’t get “ Messiah” even published and his work was so misunderstood that the family would not trust anyone else with his work since they have his notes and know the man and would truly understand his universe so well)
The same thing happened with the girl with the Dragon tattoo series. His domestic partner had all the notes and if I’m remembering correctly, he wanted her to finish and the estate wouldn’t allow it so we got horrible sequels.
But I do hope he passes on the information because obviously I want the main series finished above all, and I want fire and blood part two because he ended it on a bad ass note and the rest of dunk&egg because I’m so so curious about summer hall, which is why I want fire and blood part two. Because I’m curious about Alys rivers, aegon III reign with his brother and a ton of other stuff, but I want the main series 1st. I’m just glad we’re still getting quality content theory videos put out there still like this talking about the magic which is the most fascinating for me.
There’s a recent (like two weeks ago maybe? Or a month) Reddit thread in r/asoiaf that address this topic. Essentially someone posted because they got sad because they were scrolling through and saw someone who was doing a reread, and then they were asking if there was anything they should be looking for in particular and how excited they were for this series and they were basically just wondering what happened to the person and then a lot of huge people from the community dropped off the map. I’m grateful for channels like this and radio Westeros, in deep geek, alt swift x, etc (and this channel obviously and soo many others, David lightbringer (I hope I got the channel name right just did a long video with all the magic systems) especially for keeping it going. But basically everyone had different feelings about it.
Lots of anger, lots of sadness and a lot of disappointment. It was a mixed thread. No one chewed each other out or invalidated anyone’s opinions/feelings on it or their frustration . But essentially addressed why they agreed or disagreed like honestly it was pretty wholesome, even though it was really a sad thread.
A lot of it circles back to what people believe the authors “owe” their fans. And there was a really good UA-cam short(probably on tiktok) about this and I was just scrolling but as soon as I heard that topic, I was like this is about thrones and sure enough it address thrones and only thrones. It was four different people within the fandom. I think the ultimate agreement was the author doesn’t owe the fans anything however I forget the way they worded it, but that wasn’t the actual conclusion. The actual conclusion was a little bit more complicated where it’s like technically, the author owes us nothing however, at the same time you’ve got a loyal base who support you and we would be happy if it was released and just even if it ended mid page, mid sentence just something (some people disagreed but 🤷🏻♀️) . It was just stated better. We aren’t entitled to anything. But it is frustrating as so many of us have put so much energy/money/time and we are paranoid it won’t happen now. Double edged sword. Excuse any typos. Neuropathy and talk to text hates me🥴.
@@BCrane-ej4iqand yes getting fire&blood which was amazing but I was like damn I was hoping to get winds first. But I was ecstatic for any content. Then it ended on an amazing cliffhanger and I was like well shit there goes another.
I was so so grateful for the content but then now it’s like I wanted the main series finished but now I’m invested in this history book with unreliable narrators and it ended on a bad ass part where I was like YESSSS YOU GO KING!!! and I don’t think there will be a part two released.
Harrenhall is too close to the Isle of Faces, green men live there and they're just messing with too close to their home.
Much more to it
I think a lot of the visions we see and hear about, are future or present people sending them, only for them to be misinterpreted by the receiver thanks to the symbolic nature of ASOIAF’s astral realm that the messages are sent from in the first place. It’s like trying to communicate via a game of charades in a foggy room while also building an ikea desk. 😅
Bloodraven said that they can't change the past, not that they can't be heard. It works with bill and ted rules, you can't change anything because you already did it.
Time-travelling Bran is my favorite theory.
Right? That’s one of my first theories that I had while reading the books. I know it’s popular but I was surprised that, when I finally got into reading other peoples thoughts about the series, it wasn’t discussed more and taken more seriously.
It just didn’t make sense for the Bran that we are reading about in the books would be the same Bran we see whispering to people in their own point of view chapters. It always seemed like a future more educated and practiced Bran. And it would hold major implications for the story as a whole reaching back thousands of years before the book series even starts!
@@DNotzzBran isn't the only one hooked up to a tree. The spiders on the web eat the flies stuck to it and Bran is symbolically and literally trapped in the web.
Spoiler Warning:
Danny has been set up symbolically as a spider since the first line in her first chapter. It's Grrms first and most subtle warning that Danny is going to be the one to kill Bran and tend to the webs of the weirwoods.
@@DNotzz100% me too. It seemed/seems obvious to me. What is Bran's purpose otherwise? I think it's show-only that he leaves the cave.
I think it's Daemon in the trees, angry bc he now knows what dude ends up doing and the impact it has.
Highly doubt that, that’s a whole side story lol
27:47 The voice probably came from Daemon himself in the future from the weirwood net
I thought it was Damon’s own inner thought at first, like a remnant of one of his weir wood dreams but then when the other guy reacted to it I gave up that thought right away! They distracted me just like GRRM does in the books!
Ahh you're team deamon ends up on a weirwood root throne, too? :)
Eh, Daemon was a traitor too though
I have a small theory about weirwood communication.
I wonder if Brean being a child slows him to figure out how to speak thru the trees. How he understands how to speak using wind and leaves as metaphor and whispers, and not directly speaking as himself. There seems to be a divide on when bran tries to communicate as himself and when he is just observing and he whispers a feeling to himself. Like ‘winter fell’ vs ‘father, it’s me bran!’
I feel like bloodraven is too self centered to try to communicate as something not himself, like he needs to be SEEN and you should know it’s HIM and he is IMPORTANT. Like ego prevents you from communicating directly.
It would also kinda tie into Euron being a student but maybe he was too old so the three eyed crow tried a younger student.
Just a silly thought but I hope it makes sense!
This was the release of the Winds of Winter. I hope you enjoyed it.
I think bloodraven is trying to stop bran from changing the past, because he knows it dangerous or forbidden by the old gods, so he is lying about it.
Trying to avoid unintended consequences, perhaps
So in a nutshell, GRRM is crying in the Harrenhal Godswood as he sees how his source material is being misunderstood or ignored by the show, right?
I think Bran keeps checking in at the Winterfell tree. Staying in touch with what's going on at home.
I definitely think he was at the wedding for sure watching.
Simon Strong. That is all.
"Why it matters"
You mean like how the children of the forest and the Weirwood trees matter, right?
I’m hoping that daemon was the greenseer before bloodraven and it’s daemon speaking
Yes, yes, the deeper battle of kings going on is the tree kings versus the crypt kings
The logos moves through all things, including time!
Perhaps Bran can communicate with the past better than Bloodraven, It's because Bran's power is stronger than BR's, due to his Stark blood
Children tha singers understand others speech is ice crackling sound.And of course Bloodraven is lying 2 him or just not telling till he is ready.thnx brada
I'm glad you said it could be Bloodraven because that was my assumption. I don't think this flies in the face of anything he told Bran when you consider Bloodraven would just dismiss it as impossible if he didn't succeed as much as he wanted. Even someone hearing the whisper, if they're dismissing it anyway, wouldn't be enough to count as a success. I'm betting we'll see this pay off in the Knight of the Seven Kingdoms show
Words are wind...
I don't think you can exactly 'learn' to hear the old gods, I think you need to make a sacrifice. Theon can hear the tree because, like Bran, he has been close to death and lost a part of himself. Jojen gets green dreams after he is nearly killed by a fever and Jaime has a weirwood dream after he loses his hand. Theon has symbolically died and been reborn, he even looks like a ghost. The drumming is like shamanic drumming to bring him into the spirit world, the tree touches him with a bloody hand, and he thinks of sacrificing himself in front of the tree, which is what greenseers do and what Bloodraven has done to become part of the old gods.
I think the whisper was blood raven in HOTD. Bran doesn't care enough personally about that situation to blurt out "traitor"
The ordering of the scenes is what people are upset about.
The daemon in harrenhall whole plot line was for him to have character growth and make his decision on whether to push himself as king, or rhanyra as queen.
From a storytelling perspective, that last vision of saying "this is the future and you support rhanyra on the throne" takes the choice out of his hands, and in the end, he didnt choose for himself that rhanyra is the best person for the throne.
If they had swapped some scenes around, such that he gets the vision after bending the knee, the arc would be nicely completed.
It does just sit into the overall critique that hotd is very loosely string together between scenes. Daemon gathering big cheers for himself then pointng them to rhanyra doesnt follow from the episode before where Tully and the rivermen give their support to her, and begrudgingly dont kick daemon to the curb
Daemon didn't grow as a character, he was chopped down and hijacked just like the tree net. You are right about one thing though, his choice to support rhaenyra wasn't his own.
@@pyramidion5911except it was foreshadowed from the first season when he continued to serve and obey his brother over and over, despite serving himself and being disobedient over and over. When he was confronted and it matters then he’s always bent the knee and not tried to grasp the power he obviously wanted…
Maybe it wasn’t his choice, alys is playing him and other big time, but like I said, clear foreshadowing allowed me to predict he would bend the knee and remain loyal to rhaenyra or house targ, or maybe loyal to the expectation of “his betters” or others.
If you pay attention to the words Bloodraven uses, he says the people he loved couldn’t hear him. Since Sir Alfred isn’t someone Bloodraven loves, it might be why he could hear “traitor” in the wind, but not Daemon.
I think BLOODRAVENs wrong that no one can hear..Like Others in the Fandom i believe BR has already tried this with Aerys The Mad King and his INFAMOUS LINE OF " BURN THEM ALL"" ..I think BR tried to tell The Mad King about " The coming of the Long Nightv2.0..And It drove Aerys MAD😂 but thats my take on why i think BR tells Bran that its a NO GO ZONE.cos of how wrong it went last time.or maybe a Thousand and....1 are wrong #If u know u know😂
I think BR was intentionally trying to get Bran to tamper with things because he is trying to lure out another figure in the net that attacks anyone who does just that.
There is another possibility. Daemon is the greenseer who calls the traitor a traitor. Daemon could learn this is possible bit dangerous, and thus bloodraven then chooses to tell bran it's not possible because he's not ready to have that kind of power. This is also possible without Daemon being a greenseer but I think he's most likely to be calling him a traitor. I also think daemon is clearly being set up as a greenseer figure. Alys fed him weirwood paste. He had lots of visions. Yada Yada. His visions are different than the kind bran has as his seem to be things from his past that haunt him whereas bran seems to see the objectively true past but who knows.
I think Daemon is going to be revealed as Bloodraven’s predecessor. I think it was Daemon in the future going back in time and whispering that.
Season 2 was filled with GRRM meat that is often missed.
Why did my brain 'auto complete' this to: "why the Winds of Winter is taking so long"?
To speak to him in private,Daemon takes him straight to the Godswood, right in front of the weirwood, them almost smirks at his suggestion that WE NEED A KING...then tells him that he'd never giess him for a turn cloak.
I am wondering is future bran making a timeline thats for the worlds best outcome or his best outcome is he pulling a doctor strange or a kang
People were getting upset because they want to make ASOIAF a hard magic system with rules like Harry Potter or DnD. Dragon Dreams are X & only Targs can have them & they are X only & from X source. Greenseers are Y & they work this other way & the source is Y only. You need glass candles for long distance communication, wargs are Z with Z powers, etc. I don't think the magic is that predictable & formulaic in ASOIAF & you are always dealing with unreliable narrators & POVs with diff agendas like the Maesters. So why couldn't Daemon have weirwood visions at Harranhal? Why couldn't Helaena have the ability to communicate via visions as well as have Dragon Dreams of the future? I enjoyed the magic fantastical touches they added to HotD otherwise it's just a medieval political drama & I can watch a show about The Medici, Borgias or Tudors for that :) The original GOTs series eliminated most of the magic & magical characters from the show, I'm glad they added that subtext back in with HotD. It is supposed to be a fantasy story...
Yeah, they may be ice and fire, but both magic sources deal heavily in blood sacrifice, mental bonds with animals, and of course visions.
Words are literally wind
Using what you said about how many times GRRM uses “the words are wind” :
“The Winds of Winter” becomes “The Words of Winter”
Most likely a coincidence, but it does invite some deeper thought into the meaning of the title
Bran and Bloodraven either have access to the knowledge of all the previous Greenseers (some of whom are "alive" via the trees Or they share consciousness with them, they are kind of multiple minds in one or two bodies.
So is it Bran "Bran" or "Bran Plus" communicating with Theon?
Alot of characters hear the wind or look at the moon right before important things happen....Jon hears a voice when he finds Ghost and Arya does too a few times, Breanna and Catlin...it's all over the place in ASOIF
ur the goat, i only have seen the shows, but you have officially got me to read the first book!
I think The Blood Raven is trying to spare Bran the pain of not being able to change the past. The Raven has spent thousands of years longing for his family and trying to change bad things that has happened to them. His words may be heard but those hearing have no understanding of what is said. Even if it were understood, like what Halaena said, "It won't change a thing." Halaena understands but knows what has been and what will be can't be changed.
Must’ve been the wind…..
Another thing of note, there is litterally a town in the Summer Isles known as Talking Trees Town. So, yeah. Maybe someone there knows enough to listen.
It’s “tall trees town”
Not talking
I definitely lean towards Bloodraven. Hes hiding that power from Bran until he is responsible enough to use it.
I'm inclined to believe this is all Bran. He's setting up the world to be as he remembers it so that he can manipulate Bloodraven into coming north to send messages to his younger self to come north to meet Bloodraven and learn about his abilities and then set up the to be as he remembers it.
Think Eren Jaegar except no giant naked giants.
If winds = words, then The Winds of Winter would mean the Words of Winter, potentially foreshadowing that the characters are literally going to hear the words of and communicate with winter itself. IMO this means that there will be some communication with the Others at some point in the future.
A complex topic. Can you hear the Old Gods?
I thing I've suspected is that part of BR's (I'll give him some rope) misunderstanding, it there are requirements. Perhaps whatever can give you the ability to skin change can also make you capable of hearing the voices. BR frames it as a failing or limit of greenseer and doesn't seem to consider it's a limit of the reciever. Ned hearing Bran could be because he can, not because Bran can make him hear. People who can hear (book wise) also tend to he broken in some way. They've reached a point they deeply question themselves rather than firmly standing on strong beliefs.
Is it BR? Perhaps. This is an interesting number of theories to draw from. Some people even believe Nettles was preparing Daemon to be a greenseer as we and imagine he ended up beneath Harrenhall on a throne. In which case it could be Daemon talking to his own past.
The possibilities of this topic open up considerably when you consider the name of the next book. If "words are wind" then what are the "winds of winter?" There's a bit of a logic gap, imho, when people consider the nature of winter and the Old Gods.
Something I think you should consider. The Kight of the Laughing tree. Strip back to the symbolism of tree with a booming voice. See it not as a knight, but as the embodiment of a tree rescuing Howland.
The fun is just beginning, let the theories be fruitful and bountiful
The one thing that gets me about some of the Bran theories, is that they give him too much power. He's the only one going back in time, clearly teaching multiple things he has no knowledge of ( like architecture), and manipulating everything, because he's an extra special superhuman person with extra special skills and abilities. In the theories i like the least, he has the ability to try things over and over and keep tweaking things. He can't make a mistake because he can just do over.. It just doesn't feel right to me that one character has all the narrative weight. If everyone is just a pawn what is even the point.
I like the idea that there are several people with overlapping and conflicting goals. Just because Bloodraven can't do it, doesn't mean any of the others who have been greenseers over thousands and thousands of years can't. I have a feeling that it's more like, the longer you're connected to the weirwoods, the less connected/interested in the world you are. So in the present, Bran connects to the people he knows - Ned, Theon, as well as a random selection from the past. In the times of HOTD, it's someone who has connection to those characters - be that Bloodraven, or Dameon in the future, or some unknown character that is kinda pissed that someone's trying to get Dameon back on a bad path after all that therapy work.
The easiest thing to do is make Bran talk with Brandon the Builder,we´ll get to see the origins of everything and a way to revert whatever happened ind the past, maybe as a "surprise" we learn that the forest kids fucked up something very important. Also you could throw some time travel shenanigans with the idea that the talk with someone from the future made Brandon choose the words of his house.
Well technically Bran can have all of the special powers in the world and it wouldn't matter because all greenseers are ultimately powerless. As the future is predetermined
There is no prophecy that has gone wrong yet and we know that the Hodor reveal came from George.
In a predetermined time travel scenario, it doesn't matter how much power the greenseers really have. They can't change the past.
Why is bloodraven so young in the vision? He's lived a full life before committing himself to the tree as an old man
I’ve argued: (1( Theon is a greenseer himself. He dreams of the feast of the dead at Winterfell with Robb there.
(2) Quite likely Euron Greyjoy’s bastard son. Since Euron slept with one of his brother’s sons, he probably would have tried w others too. This creates a powerful symmetry among all three of the oldest boys raised at Winterfell if Jon is secretly Rhaegar’s son, Theon is secretly Euron’s son, and Robb Stark is secretly Brandon Stark’s son because Brandon slept with his fiancée Catelyn before going off to challenge Rhaegar in King’s Landing. Note that the scene you quote with Ned praying for Robb and Jon to grow up like brothers has an even deeper meaning if one is his sister’s son and the other is his brother’s son, both of which he is falsely claiming as his sons for their own benefit. In any case, Theon being Euron’s son makes sense next to Jon as Rhaegar’s son and Bran as Ned’s son for story purposes.
(3) Theon can hear Bran talking to him because he is this powerful greenseer himself, without knowing it yet, Euron’s son.
(4) Symbolically, and magically, Theon is slowly becoming a weirwood. He’s undergoing the transformation, and eventually he will switch places with Bran and hook into a weirwood instead of Bran: Theon has gone bone white in his skin and hair, like a weirwood. He’s lost fingers and toes, like every tree loses certain branches and roots as it grows. He’s lost his original identity. He was imprisoned under the Dreadfort in a completely dark cell and nearly starved like a greenseer hooked into the roots of a weirwood, as Bloodraven wants Bran to do.
(5) Theon is probably a symbolic parallel to the original Blackwood heart trees being infected at some point by a pathogen from a comet from outer space and turning bone white, losing their color and original identity, and becoming this alien hive mind organism.
(6) Theon is a Greek name literally meaning “with God” and I believe it’s used in the opening sentence of the Gospel of John because the Word was “with God / Theon.” Thus even his name implies that he is going eventually to become a God tree and that his transformation from Theon to Reek parallels a corruption of The One original God tree / heart tree into an undead fungus organism that has spread all over Westeros to be worshipped by men whom it effectively enslaves now.
Jeff, A Theory of Ice & Fire on Quora
Point 5 is interesting. Reminds me of what happened to the American Chestnut Trees. An invasive species of parasitic fungus was brought over with Japanese Cherry Blossoms that wiped out all the American Chestnut Trees. The Blight. It would turn the trees white as it spread.
@@S.D._777_ This is great. Thanks for sharing! That strengthens the theory. :)
Grrm loved taking real world inspiration for his stories and threading them in seamlessly I really think you are spot on with this I never even considered Robb actually being Brandon’s son and them both being cousins to bran
Words are wind confirmed
Clearly there has to be a mistake made by bloodraven that may have messed up the timeline for a song of ice and fire, we should see sometime in the series how bloodraven knows that messing with the past will change the future for worse. The past is already written, the ink is dry
You said that the old gods were people communicating with people... It makes sense. It's not really a new idea. legends talk about ancestors and the dead, who are part of the pantheon of gods, or later in various forms they can communicate with people. Today many people follow a similar mythology. Catholicism believes that if a person was good, they went to heaven. You can pray to him, and he listens to you. Additionally, there are all kinds of organizations such as the Jesuits, who take care of the spread of this religion, as well as spiritual ones, who can communicate with the spirits of the dead and pass on information. For example, knowledge of who is supposedly in purgatory or not. George could have weaved this into the books. Trees as relics hold the dead, and goodness can flow through them. You can pray to relics, like to weirwood trees. Additionally, there are many who talk about possessions - a more aggressive version of what the is found in Stark kids and what they can do. Bran can even possess a person. it seems so simulator. This would also explain why trees are corrupted... Like the reformation that shook Catholicism... like the night king almost shook the old ways.... Maybe more like Huss. And now there is a chance for the reformation of the old ways. And the knowledge of how to do it will be in Bran, the main characters will do it, and the Isle of faces will have the resources to cleanse the corruption of green magic or something like that. others can also be a reference to another faith, or different beliefs in the same category. The wife of the night king showed him: Listen, this is not like that, this is strange what they do, it's not right. that's why they scare people with Stories about them, and of the long night of darkness just like the dark ages- it is the corrupt form of green magic that is responsible and others might be just like another civilization, that has ice magic. Like green people would have green magic. The others might also be a other way of thinking about old ways, or a system. For example, catholic priest do study ancient philosophy for example greek right. So green magic, that has Build the wall and that has created others to destroy humans is a version of like... adopting life force ( green ) with destroying powers ( ice ), so the good stuff is corrupt, needs blood, and Ring women in their wedding night and kiļļīñğ babies. And Bran or the guys in the system realized that it is sick, so they need another destroying force ( fire ) that won with Roynar ( water, water that gives life, is life. Without it nothing can grow). So the plan is to let ice and fire clash, and by making that war, green magic can be brought back and the fire magic will not be sustained because of lack of the dragons, they will die in future anyway. So a power vacuum will be replace with water magic maybe... Like Dorn has that blood that lost to Valyriaz but then resisted Agon's line. Then they married water to fire and only suffered after. And also live in a desert more or less... a desert is a sort of corruption of fertility, that green magic is known for, and would maybe spown, or as it will grow stronger because off the combined actions of Bran, Isle of faces, green man, and other hearos will spown also water magic, so the song of Ice and fire ( after ice, snow and winter comes spring with grass and melted snow- water that will be made because of the battle with ice and fire, though in a more human- way) will start a new song, a song of grass and water tha can and will prosper together and not be destroying one another. Sort of like a battle of faith. After reforming it, something different will take it's place, something that will not be corrupted by it's predecessor. And it might be so that green magic will prosper in Westeros, and water magic will take over Esos, and/ or Dorne makin that land green and full of water. And by magic I mean the new way of look at thing also. And Bran will be the on, to tell someone that remembers and mises the opd ways and would like to go back to the old ways like... no, it's fine now, that and that happend, becouse of that and that. We are good now.
I don't know. It might be a fan fiction at that point but, someone would maybe be able to take some peace and make a nice video about it :)
I think it's not explicitly *just* the ability of the particular greenseer, whether Bran or Bloodraven or someone else, but also the abilities of the person who is on the receiving end -- Bloodraven may tell Bran "no word of mine has ever reached them" *because he was attempting to speak to people who could not understand tree-language* and so from his perspective it felt like every attempt at communication failed... aaaaaand I was about to say "but there is someone in lore who CAN speak to trees"... and then I decided to check ahead in the video and saw Howland Reed's face, I think you and I went to the same place with that thought xD
Remember how surprised Rocket was that Thor could speak Groot
Oh my god that makes so depressed
What the hell man
Bran breaks through the Time barrier? And time slips too a critical moment. The wheel of causality?
don't you think that Daemon heard the voice? i think that he did.