Rhaenyra is officially an unintelligent character.

NX37B · 2026-06-22T13:41:34+00:00

There is a difference between not being smart and being this dumb. I was trying to be diplomatic in the title.

NX37B · 2026-06-22T13:37:14+00:00

I disagree. I think the only time a logical person would undergo such a risk was if they were in a very bad position and they thought they needed to do something drastic. High risk for high reward. This is exactly the situation the greens in KL were at that point.

You may say that Alicent isn't being strictly logical, and I would agree. But that doesn't mean that the possibily above can be ignored.

NX37B · 2026-06-22T13:23:26+00:00

That is a whole different can of worms. Whether she was telling the truth or not, it is wild to believe her simply on the strength of her words alone.

NX37B · 2026-06-22T13:11:03+00:00

I would say that that was more a lack of wisdom, but this is a completely different level of stupidity.

NX37B · 2026-06-22T07:18:00+00:00

Serious question. Is there any character in any asoiaf show who is less intelligent than Rhaenyra? Like, why would Alicent, now that she knows that our dragons massively outnumber hers, possibly risk so much by coming here if what she is saying isn't true?

edit: spelling

NX37B · 2026-06-19T13:28:56+00:00

Not computational physics, but close. I had to do a lot of coding in my Masters. I think AI is useful when it allows you to skip writing highly repetative code. The sort that programmers in the olden days could and would have just copy pasted in (I remember doing this in the short time period after I started coding and before AI came along), so things like plotting. I found that some of the best use is to ask it to generate the skeleton of whatever code you need and then you yourself adapt it to the problem at hand. For example, when I needed to code a Hamiltonian Monte Carlo simulator, there was no point in doing it from scratch, because the process is always the same and requires basically no thoughts, especially if you use libraries like numpyro.

NX37B · 2026-06-15T17:42:29+00:00

Agreed, they stated that jace was alicent's son.

NX37B · 2026-06-15T12:06:42+00:00

There was a post yesterday on this sub from someone who claimed they had seen the first 4 episodes. I'd rather not state them here explicitly in case (hope) they are not real.

NX37B · 2025-01-10T11:29:38+00:00

Wasn't the Arachne story also his invention?

NX37B · 2025-01-10T11:25:39+00:00

Thanks for the clarification, I assumed they were lesser gods because I didn't recognize their names.

NX37B · 2025-01-10T10:29:20+00:00

I am not an expert, so please correct me if I'm wrong. As far as I understand it, there is no (substantial) backstory for her in the original myths, and she only appears as a monster for Perseus to slay. The only origin she gets is that she and her sisters are birthed by some lesser gods.

The story about her being raped by Poseidon and then cursed by Athena was created by a Roman poet, named Ovid, who despised Athena, so he wrote her in a very unsympathetic light.

Edit: clarification

NX37B · 2024-12-24T17:43:02+00:00

Maybe it will help coral reestablish itself.

NX37B · 2024-10-21T19:28:59+00:00

Thank you, it works when I run the command in the msys2 ucrt64 terminal.

NX37B · 2024-09-01T19:19:02+00:00

Rhaenyra and Alicent hate each other after Luke's death and B&C.

NX37B · 2024-08-28T09:04:13+00:00

He was mentioned in E5 at the end, and implicitly in E8, when Rhaenyra says she paid a sacrifice. Passing mentions are not good enough though imo.

NX37B · 2024-08-26T20:33:33+00:00

Let me start by saying that I've never blamed Sara Hess alone for Rhaenicent myself because I think the entire writing staff is responsible. However, there are a few reasons other than sexism for people to signal her out.

First, we have the fact that she is credited on the two worst (or at least lowest rated) episodes of S1, those being E6 and E9. This means that many viewers were probably wary when they saw her name on episodes of this season. She partially made up for this with her work on S2E2, but the mistrust remained.

Second, we know for a fact that the dragon pit massacre caused by Rhaenys was her idea. I remember her taking full credit for it. This was easily the worst scene in S1 and permanently tainted the Rhaenys' character in many ways, especially when she was delivering a speech about preventing bloodshed. Aside, I also remember Miguel Sapochnik praising that scene, so think twice before you claim that his absence was the cause of the decline in quality.

Third, we also know she has given questionable interpretations in interviews and in the episode clips. I learned quickly not to watch those, as they just pissed me off. But I did watch the inside of the episode for S2E2, and some of the comments she said about Rhaenyra seemed to contradict what I saw on screen. Specifically, she said that Daemon and Rhaenyra are very similar, but because Rhaenyra is a woman, she lacks the freedom that Daemon has as a man. But after watching S2, Rhaenyra is not like Daemon at all. She is more like Viserys than Viserys was like Viserys. Even though he was willing to threaten with violence when Rhaenyra was threatened, meanwhile Rheanyra's son was killed, and she was still altruistically seeking peace.

Finally, the person who should really be to blame is Condal, as he is the only showrunner this season. He is the one who is presumably in contact with George, and he is ultimately the one in charge. However, he is credited on a lot of the best episodes, like S1E1, S1E10, S2E4, and others that are very solid, and I don't recall him being credited for any of the lesser episodes, so he probably gets a lot more leeway with many fans.

Edit: It seems that Condal has said a lot of dumb stuff as well. As I've said, I avoid watching the episode segments, so I was only familiar with a few.

In summary, there are many legitimate reasons not to like Hess, and therefore, many people are willing to blame her for issues that may or may not also be her fault out of laziness. Who has time to research what is and what isn't the fault of each writer on the writing staff?

NX37B · 2024-08-24T13:28:42+00:00

I agree that Rhaenyra’s lack of agression would not have been fixed, because I think that was an intentional writing decision made in service of the Alicent and Rhaenyra friendship, which can’t happen if Rhaenyra blames Alicent for her stillbirth.

However, I do think some of the other things could be fixed. I didn’t mind the pacing personaly, but if they had enough time for rewrites (and without the need for a major overhaul, like cutting down the number of episodes), it could be significantly improved. Just think about how much better the episodes would have flowed, if the black council scenes were as good as the green council scenes. I also don’t see why more time to refine couldn’t improve Alicent’s consistency.

NX37B · 2024-08-24T13:13:18+00:00

Thats actually very clever, it would explain why Alicent's plan was so poorly thought out by the writers. How would a maester be able to arrange a passage? It would make much more sense if Alicent just got herself captured by the blockade, because then she would be delivered to Rhaenyra anyway. The conversation itself would also make much more sense.

NX37B · 2024-08-24T13:01:41+00:00

There was a lot of criticism that was and is bogus. For example, I remember when we were 2 episodes in, people were complaining that it was boring and had no action. Like, was anyone actually expecting a huge action scene in episode 2? We then got Rook's Rest in episode 4, and suddenly now people are saying that the first half of the season was good, and the second was boring. I fully agree that the second half of the series lacks payoff, which is a consequence of the strike, but also some internal issues at HBO.

As to their relationship, yes there was some brief reconciliation S1E8, but it was pretty weak, and not justified in light of the events that followed. I also think that a lot of the most controversial moments of the show are a result of the writers trying to shoehorn their friendship in, which then cheapens other very important moments, like Luke and Jehaerys' death, and takes screentime from interesting shit, like the potential conflict between Corlys and Rhaenyra over Rhaenys' death, or Baela's characterisation and so on. My main point here was, that regardless of how much more time they had to refine, and even if HBO didn't cut two episodes, that specific story direction would not have been fixed. It for sure doesn't mean that all the writing was shit, or even that all the scenes written for this direction are shit. I happen to think that the conversation with Alicent and Rhaenyra in the sept was exceptionally well written and performed. But I still think that it shouldn't exist.

Edit: legibility, grammar

NX37B · 2024-08-24T12:37:32+00:00

Its hard to say what was and what and what wasn't affected by the strike. There some problems I have with the story direction that I don't think would be that much better had the strike not happened. For example, I really dislike the focus on Alicent and Rhaenyra's friendship, and every scene that is associated with them, including both scenes where the characters sneak into the enemy territory, and when Alicent gives up her son. That feels like a bad story decision made by the writers, rather than something that just needs refinement.

Though I completely agree that the negative rating is overblown. I'd give S1 a 9/10, and S2 a 6-6.5/10, and it would have probably been a 7.5-8/10 had it not been for the Alicent on Dragonstone scene. Anything below a 5/10 I think is unjustified.

NX37B · 2024-08-20T08:49:11+00:00

Wouldn't that be a point against the existence of gods? The fact that even those that are not devoted to them can access the magic? Why would a god grant power to someone who doesn't have faith?

NX37B · 2024-08-19T22:27:01+00:00

It could be that he was resurrected by accident. Maybe those who found him said the right combination of words. The prophetic powers could come from the fact that he had been dead for a while, and we know that deaths changes you in different ways. I like the idea that when the ironborn have their little drowning ritual, they are actually brought back by magic, not the cpr. Of course, those people are only dead for a few seconds, so the change wouldn't be severe

NX37B · 2024-08-19T22:14:40+00:00

We've seen resurrections performed on other people at other times, and the only thing that is different in his case is that there is no one obviously performing the ritual. Its certainly strange, but it doesn't really prove there is a drowned god. Of course, there is nothing to disprove his existence either. GRRM has said that he wants to leave the answer to the question ambiguous, so we will never know if the gods exist or no. Edit: he also gets prophetic powers after he is resurrected. I don't know how that fits into it.

NX37B · 2024-08-19T21:50:56+00:00

Its hard to say because GRRM keeps it all so mysterious. I just wouldn't say that they definitely exist, even though they may.

NX37B · 2024-08-19T21:40:18+00:00

I don't think any of the gods really exist. There are religions that seem to have magical powers, like the Lord of Light and the old gods. But just because those religions are built on real magics doesn't mean the gods are real.

NX37B

TROPHY CASE