r/ImaginaryWesteros • u/Sea_Initiative6488 Death Before Disgrace • 2d ago

Alternative Elia Martell defending Queen Rhaella from the Kingsguard by @Cj_KhalifP

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679 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

38 comments sorted by

144

u/ChudMaster69420 1d ago

Was Aerys II obsessed with prophecies? That seemed more like his father and son's interest than his

97

u/Allnamestakkennn 1d ago

I think he had his own delusions.

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u/pestoraviolita 1d ago

Egg permanently damaged Aerys and Rhaella most like. Summerhall and all.

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u/Allnamestakkennn 1d ago

He had delusions of grandeur, with many of his plans being extremely stupid and wasteful. He also had mood swings that only worsened with his reign, likely bipolar, coupled with growing insecurity, paranoia, and obsession with fire.

I think Aerys had some mental health conditions that worsened with enabling and neglect. Rhaella wasn't like that, so Summerhall wasn't as traumatizing as you might think

6

u/SerMallister Above the Rest 1d ago

We barely know anything about Rhaella.

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u/Chicken_Mc_Thuggets Above the Rest 1d ago

I think he had some form of mental illness. I’m not knowledgeable or qualified enough to say whether it’d be schizophrenia or something else

He seemed to really go off the rails after Duskendale but even before then he seemed to have delusions of grandeur. Iirc he wanted to build a second kings landing out of marble, wage war on the one bank that will put a hit out on you, and make a second wall

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u/Silver-Winging-It 1d ago

Sounds a bit like bipolar I

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u/Alt_Historian_3001 22h ago

While Summerhall was definitely psychologically devastating, the fact that he forced them to marry at 14 and 13 years old despite not liking each other at all leads me to think a good deal of Aerys' psychological damage (aside from the dragon madness) comes from having dogshit parents.

20

u/Zexapher 1d ago

Everyone in the Targaryen orbit should understand the prophecy itself to be real, but they don't necessarily need to believe it's happening now or like it.

I think Aerys is probably biased against prophecy, since it forced him into a marriage he didn't want, and led to so much of his family dying at Summerhall.

That said, his burnings and rapes do seem to follow the precept of Dany's prophecy. And at the least his blood magic rituals do lead to Dany's birth, so there's something to be said for the magical confluence around her.

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u/durrandons 1d ago

In the play prophecy plays a far bigger role and it's kinda a Targaryen family concept tied to the comet and things? He has the whole theory of the "third head is the one" that Rhaegar adopted.

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u/pestoraviolita 1d ago

In the play, he is.

127

u/pestoraviolita 1d ago

Any piece of dialogue I see from the play is clunky and weird. Anyone else feels this way?

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u/Fool-2026 1d ago

I also feel this way. Like overall play made Rhaegar "puppet", character who doesn't have any ambitions just delusions for prophecy.

42

u/pestoraviolita 1d ago

The characterisation aside, the dialogue sounds so weird and off-putting. Everything I've read of it so far sounds expository and inorganic. Like why is the kingsgaurd talking like that, explain shit? Why is Elia explaining back?

27

u/durrandons 1d ago

It definitely works better on stage than from twitter threads. But I'd say Act 2 struggled significantly more to give the scenes enough time to breathe and to just exist. So I did find it stilted at times, and unconvincing. Other times worked incredibly well, though.

Too much material to cover, we're going through the rebellion in 2x speed, and the odd pacing can show in the dialogue, especially when you can tell a scene more so exists for either moving the plot ahead or wanting to convey a specific message, rather than for the story itself or the characters. It's too many characters to cover and it just feels oddly out of place at times. You calling expository pretty much describes how a lot in Act 2 felt to me.

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u/itwasbread 1d ago

I feel like most Royal Shakespeare Company type play dialogue will sound weirder if removed from that context

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u/IWantADartlingGun 1d ago

"aren't we supposed to portect her?"

"Not from him"

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u/pestoraviolita 1d ago

Bystander Smelly is around too I guess.

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u/GodKingFloch 1d ago

Wasn't Barristan "The Bold" Getting his ass kicked with Rhaegar in the trident t by this point

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u/Alt_Historian_3001 22h ago

Aerys was doing this throughout the whole war, well before Rhaegar and his army set out for the Trident.

7

u/Kyriakos_X_23 I drink and I know things 1d ago

He is already outside Aerys’s door

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u/Sea_Initiative6488 Death Before Disgrace 2d ago

source

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u/Mindless-Cat1453 1d ago

Crazy how only jaime was concerned about queen rhaella when aeyrs was raping her , unlike barristand selmy and arthur dany.

14

u/Silver-Winging-It 1d ago

My guess is it bothered them too but attempts to persuade Aerys went badly.

And they are too tied to their vows to go forward with killing or imprisoning the king

13

u/Legened255509Druss 1d ago

Yes, but they’re all more honorable than him

According to Westeros.

God I fucking hate chivalry.

16

u/Stalinsghoast 1d ago

Yep. Plays into Martin's silent commentary that vows were all well and good in the mummer's tales but blind obedience to words led to horrid outcomes.

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u/pestoraviolita 1d ago

A piece of shit like Quentyn Fireball is considered CHIVALROUS somehow. Wow.

2

u/SerMallister Above the Rest 1d ago

I'm sure they all had their moments when they first started as well. Excepting Hightower and Barristan, who knew them when they were children.

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u/Northumbrian26 1d ago

Any art that exposes Barristan the Bystander, Gerold the White Steer, Jonothor the Pander and Arthur the Fraud of the Morning has my support.

Poor Rhaella…

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u/Kyriakos_X_23 I drink and I know things 1d ago

Poor Jon Darry hates his life

10

u/Successful_Case7960 1d ago

She deserved better than rhaegar man

10

u/Dutchman337 1d ago

Rhaegar didn't deserve elia

2

u/Margrethe13 1d ago

Thanks. I like being stabbed in the heart. 😔

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u/Alt_Historian_3001 22h ago

Goddammit if these two had lived it would have been so much better. If only these two had made it out and everyone else who canonically died died, I'd be fine.

Both Rhaella and Elia deserved way better than the hand dealt them.

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u/Holy-Wan_Kenobi 22h ago

SLAY, PRINCESS, TELL THE FRAUDSGUARD WHAT-FOR

2

u/Nirico_Brin 1d ago

The kingsguard were the biggest pieces of shit, especially in Aerys time.

The only one of them that had a shred of actual honor ended up being Jaime.