The ONLY way to finish The Winds of Winter

The fictional universe George RR Martin has set up makes any major story arc impossible to complete. As he is struggling to finish his book series, this video shows a way to nevertheless resolve all existing plotlines in a conclusive manner.

[Sebastian-lwqb]

Martin's statement about Gardener's writing sounds great, but I'm not sure he ever fully realized, that one part of a gardener's work is removing the weeds and trimming the hedges.

[Obez]

Maybe him not finishing the book series _is_ his ultimate subversion of tropes

[AdamNoizer]

I think ASOIAF is fundamentally about good people having to match their ideals with a brutal reality. I never got the impression that Martin condemns, mocks or condescends idealism with his characters - quite the opposite.

“Seven, Brienne thought again, despairing. She had no chance against seven, she knew. No chance, and no choice.
She stepped out into the rain, Oathkeeper in hand.” - Chapter 37, AFFC

Brienne does not need to get involved. She can just walk away. But in her mind *She has no choice*. She must defend the weak in every instance, at all times, regardless of the odds against her, regardless if it means her own death.

[samuelschonenberger]

Actually it being a mess of themes and building up so many storylines without finishing any is accodentally genius perhaps because now so many interpretations of themes, solutions to mysteries and continuations of stories now exist through fan theories etc

Like seriously, the reasons so many of us are still so invested in this series is because it's unfinished and could go anywhere, so we discuss every little detail and have fun doing that.

So in conclusion: The true meaning of a song of Ice and Fire is the friends we made along the way

[ingold]

This sounds a lot like the Silmarillion. The Elven kingdoms fall one-by-one to Morgoth's forces due to a combination of hubris, infighting, and Morgoth's exploits, retreat to an island, and send Earendil to beg the Valar for forgiveness. The Valar do save the elves but in the process Beleriand sinks beneath the sea, and the elves' human allies become the most powerful race in Arda.

[huonglarne]

I like how Jaime's character is a double subversion. At first he looked like the typical knight in shining armor, turned out to be a child-killing, sister-fucking, oath-breaking asshole. GRRM initially intended for him to sit the iron throne, be the main villain but that would have been too easy. And so he subverted his own expectation and wrote the greatest redemption arc in history. Jaime's character, after 2 subversions, became the one of most complex and well-liked character in the asoiaf universe.

[akeelyaqub]

Tolkien was also inspired by war. The worst war to be a solider in, in history. World war 1. He witnessed it all first hand and fought in it and he turned his experience into a story of hope for a better world. Its criminal to talk about Georges influence with the vietnam war, a war he didnt take part in but not mention ww1s influence on Tolkien, who actually did take part in it. If anybody understands war better of the two, its Tolkien.

[jeskcjg]

"And then, Heimdall will blow his might horn announcing Ragnarok, and Loki will come in his cursed ship with the unworthy dead to wage war against Asgard, accompanied by the Jotun and the fire giants, and fall in ruinous combat while also killing Heimdall. The monstrous wolves Haiti and Skol will devour the Sun and the Moon, and Fenrir finally kills the allfather Odin, being slain by his son Vengeance. Then, Thor and Jormungandr will engage in deadly battle, with Thor finally slain the serpent. Covered in the poisonous blood of the serpent of Midgard, Thor laughs, exclaiming "I did it! I've finally slain the serpent of Midgard!", then Thor takes 7 steps and falls to the ground, dead".

GRRM: "but what was Odin's tax policy?"

[ladypeahen]

In some old review, I read this quote: Martin won a contest Tolkien didn't attend. Tolkien didn´t subvert expectations, because he couldn't. He didn't write a story, he created a world (he wrote a mythology, not "a fiction"). He was the one making rules, there was no reason to violate them. Martin is telling a story about "real" people in a world where rules exist, even conflicting rules. It makes sense for the characters to not stick to them. They must break some to fulfill another.

[jhnc]

Btw the themes are post modernism even in morality eg:
if you do good, you can lose;
if you do good, you can win;
if you do evil you can win;
if you do evil you can lose .

This creates the impression that anything can happen, no one is safe.

[GenomeSoldierDK]

Arya killing the "Night King" is a very poor example to use for an example of how the books might "end" like the show- since the books doesn't mention the presence of a "Night King" whatsoever. He is purely a show fabrication. There is even footage of Dan and Dave saying something to the effect that they thought "Arya" made the most sense for the scene. So they were trying to subvert Azor Ahai - not George. This fact alone is a major contributor to why many fans despise season 8. I doubt that George will screw that part up in the books. :b

[braedenh]

High fantasy written by a devout Catholic vs. High fantasy written by an agnostic postmodernist

[Emanon...]

At this point, people waiting for the Rapture sound more convincing than fans waiting for aSoIaF to ever finish.

[awesomo]

He already broke his naming convention with A Feast for Crows

[heyygallo]

11:33 you’re assuming Ramsay treated his dogs well lol. Trained and loyal are not the same thing here

[OneOnOne]

12 minutes in now and I don't think you're really correct about all of this. "A Song of Ice & Fire" isn't about subverting Tolkien, it's about deconstructing Tolkien. Those are NOT the same things.

Subversion is just about making it superficially seem like you're going to do it in the same way, and then pulling the rug out from under people to reveal it is the opposite.

But this is not what George does. What he does is he takes a closer look at the assumptions and beliefs inherent in Tolkien's writing and lays out the benefits, the downsides, the flaws, and the nuances of them.

Your example about advice is actually a good one to go to in order to illustrate this. Your argument is that Robert and Ned is a subversion of Gandalf and Theodin because in this case good advice just strengthens the bad king's bad qualities. But putting aside whether that's a fair description, I don't really think it is, I would point you to someone like Young Griff. This character is clearly set up to be advised in a better way and, though hardly perfect, to probably be willing to listen to his advisors and make some good decisions too. Daenerys does as well. She struggles to create peace in Meereen, listens to some of her advisors, and helps to create peace. Yes, the peace falls apart due to bad actors but she did still manage to create peace.

This nuance is possible because, again, you're not correct about what George is trying to create. He isn't trying to subvert Tolkien, he is trying to deconstruct him. Show all of the nuances, assumptions and investigate them. Martin's world also is not nihilistic, it's existentialist in nature. George's world isn't about saying there is no meaning, it's about saying that people choose their meaning.

[Concreteowl]

Tolkien himself delighted in subverting or distorting Shakespeare. Macbeth gets quite a bit of this.

[nont]

While I agree with your ending, the only thing I disagree is that Jon somehow barely participated in this at all, considering that he’s a character who’s the most invested in this white walker issue since the beginning. He should be the one to do something about it, not being left out altogether because “subversion”.

[bilnik]

I find this analysis is a little myopic, for a couple of reasons, I will try to my best to give a few.

First of all, A Song of Ice and Fire isn't specifically a response to Tolkien; the reputation it gets for being "subversive" is in large part owed to the TV show that marketed itself as being adult and subversive of fantasy. Asoiaf is still heavy with tropes and themes, and there is nothing particularly anti-fantasy about it. There are unexpected twists and turns, and quite a few of them, but what makes them shocking is the fact that the story has been silently building to them while we the readers are none the wiser. GRRM's comments about Tolkien are not specifically a criticism of Tolkien himself as a writer but a commentary of the impact his work has had on fantasy (which he himself is not immune to) and the way The Lord of the Rings has shaped the genre in ways Tolkien himself could never have anticipated.

As in your commentary about chivalry in the books, I don't think GRRM is critical of the concept of chivalry; quite the contrary. Though yes, the idealism of characters like Sansa and Jaime who revere the knights of the songs and legend gets brutally tested, the Starks are posited as the heroes of the story precisely because of their honor and decency. Rather, I would argue what the story proposes is that chivalry and the strict code of honor the characters subscribe to (at least in theory) is the only failsafe in a system that is very much ripe for exploitation, from people like the Lannisters who have very little scrupples and will do anything to promote their own interests. However family ties are not portrayed as a necessarily bad thing; the Starks suffer for being parted from one another and all struggle to get home. "The lone wolf dies but the pack survives". Familial bonds are important. However they should not hamper one's partiality, as is demonstrated again by the Lannisters.

You also mention the famous quote about Aragorn's tax policy and you specifically say 'he'd do what a wise and good King would do' but that's exactly the point... you can be as wise and good as you can, that still can not surmount the limitations of your resources and circumstances (as demonstrated by Daenerys in the books), and when there's a famine a good King may have to take harsh decisions. Politics is complicated, and goodness is not always rewarded in real life; for example, Ned Stark does the honorable thing and gets punished for it, because not everyone is playing by the rules. If they were, meaning, if everyone was chivalrous, then he wouldn't have met that end, but he makes that assumption because of his own morality and that brings about his downfall. I'd argue the framing tricks us here but it's not subversion for subversion's sake, it is the natural conclusion of what the story has been building up to since the beginning.

I am also puzzled by your final point about the significance of the "father myth" because the inclusion of a personified god is very much not what makes Tolkien's lore work, and it shouldn't really be, Tolkien draws from a rich tradition of myths and stories, building upon them and weaving them into an intricate tapestry that produces something new. GRRM takes a more nihilistic approach and is critical of systems that can be abused to the detriment of the vulnerable, ergo, he is critical of religion; though it is unclear whether supernatural forces that we might name Gods are at play here, in fact that is heavily suggested. That is also not subversion for subversion's sake, as the philosophical concept of a god who is either indifferent to humanity or not necessarily benevolent is one that predates Martin. Tolkien appeals to our inner goodness and innocence that fables often cater to and as such his universe is governed by benevolent forces and his characters are fundamentally good. Each story is different. Each makes a different point. So each uses different building blocks to get to it.

All in all, while I find most of your arguments compelling for the most part, I think the thesis of this video boils down to Tolkien-Good Martin-Bad, and I don't see why that is; they take fundamentally different stances on a lot of matters, but each has its own merits and each brand of fantasy does have a place in the jaded world that we occupy in the present moment. And they are both, at the end of the day, escapism into imagination, if you really think about it.

And lastly, I would like to believe that "war is bad" is a pretty much uncontroversial statement. No?

[fratertzadkiel]

It reminds me of the story of how "Easy Rider" had no ending when filming started; they were originally going to cross the entire country. After six months of shooting mostly useless footage the studio hired a script doctor to write a satisfying, but quick ending. I will not spoil the ending here, but he got paid a lot of money for a few lines of text.