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Malcolm_Ten t1_ixhcz1l wrote

Book readers know that his character is actually the one who trains with Jaime in later volumes. Bronn of course is more entertaining, but it made total sense that a man with no tongue would be the perfect sparring partner. I would have enjoyed seeing more of Wilko.

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TheTrueMilo t1_ixhjj24 wrote

Yeah, Jaime picks Ser Ilyn specifically because he cannot speak and is also probably illiterate, so he can't go around King's Landing telling everyone how shitty Jaime is as a swordsman.

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Drkarcher22 t1_ixhotpl wrote

Then he starts using him almost like a therapist for his relationship with Cersei when he goes to Riverrun to end the siege there.

> Ser Ilyn made the perfect drinking companion. He never interrupted, never disagreed, never complained or asked for favors or told long pointless stories. All he did was drink and listen.

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AFineDayForScience t1_ixhs2a1 wrote

He's just sitting there listening to Jaime talk about fucking his sister like 😮‍💨

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why_rob_y t1_ixhriid wrote

I guess everyone's different, but to me that sounds like a worse than average drinking companion. But I can see why Jaime would like that.

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Drkarcher22 t1_ixhtb7k wrote

>“I never understood what Jaime saw in you, apart from his own reflection.”

Yeah, Jamie is a narcissist through and through, and the people close to him know it.

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Holovoid t1_ixhvkk3 wrote

By the point in the books where he's using Ilyn as a therapist he's actively working on overcoming his narcissism too.

Maybe.

Who knows what his ending in the book will be.

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DUBLH t1_ixi12k2 wrote

Something something never really cared about them, innocent or otherwise. I’m still mad

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Minivalo t1_ixi4xrk wrote

Of all the incredibly dumb stuff they had in the later seasons of GoT, that infuriatingly stupid line, and generally how they handled Jaime and Cersei probably annoyed me the most. Absolutely butchered his redemption arc (though obviously he did some stuff there's no redeeming from)

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IndyRevolution t1_ixib8h7 wrote

They became the same stupid "middle aged anti-villain power couple" you see on every fucking prestige show. Despise it.

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I_am_so_lost_hello t1_ixiojxc wrote

Him going back to ceresi is fine but they spent like 2 minutes on it after 7 seasons of character development.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixigfln wrote

ASOIAF is really packed with “soul-searching knights past their prime.” It starts to be exhausting.

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AssinassCheekII t1_ixi53p4 wrote

Man dishonored himself for the rest of his life and killed the king he was sworn to protect.

To protect the people in KL from burning to dust.

"I never cared..." Sure bud.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixihcm5 wrote

Honestly that was always bullshit. Aerys had already killed Ned’s dad and brother, and it’s not like Jaime’s motivation for killing Aerys is hard to understand. Why did Ned just…not get it? Why didn’t anyone? Everyone knew that Aerys was dangerous.

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Podo13 t1_ixj2ios wrote

I don't think most people knew what Aerys was trying to do when Robert's army got there. Even Robert and Ned didn't know the truth.

To them, Jaime did in fact stab his king in the back to end the war and that was it. His honor was already so far gone that he didn't really tell anybody why he had done it. Also, his ego and the believability of a king telling them to "burn them all" probably stopped him from saying it.

The only reason he wasn't executed after Robert took power was because of his last name and who he shared it with (Tywin).

Also, Ned was loyal to an absolute fault. He didn't care for any real reasons. Jaime broke an oath and that was enough to despise him for (which was Ned's biggest fault).

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixj42z6 wrote

I get all of that in the immediate aftermath. What beggars belief is that, in the intervening 15 years, no one seems to have asked Jaime why he did it. There were other people in the room. Aerys and the Targaryens in general had a reputation for being crazy and violent. It’s a bit of backstory meant to set up rivalries and character growth, but it depends on characters like Ned and Varys just not being very curious, or forgetting to ask easy questions.

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Podo13 t1_ixj6357 wrote

I think there was also a belief that he did it at Tywin's request. And nobody was going to fuck with Tywin, so they kept their mouth's shut.

Brienne was the first person he told and in reality he was pretty vague about it all. He gave some possible facts, but didn't really go far into what he was actually feeling.

But, honestly, at his core, Jaime is an ultra narcissist who knows he killed Aerys out of self-preservation and leaving out some of the true bits kept people talking about him and paying attention to him. Jamie didn't care about glory. He enjoyed fighting and killing, and if he had to be known as the Kingslayer to keep doing those things, so be it. Which I think Ned subconsciously knew and it's why he always looked down on him more than just calling him a, derogatory name.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixj9uzi wrote

I guess I’m taking a weird overarching view of it, because a whole throughline of Dany’s arc is the question whether people want the Targaryens back, and the history in Fire and Blood/HOTD shows that they were most likely glad to be rid of them, so assuming a bit of public sentiment there…it just doesn’t track that Jaime has this reputation. I mean, Ned fought on the other side to depose Aerys. Did he think Aerys would survive that? The a-ha of honor is silly and it’s a false way to trigger an “all sides are bad” baseline when, again, it got the results Ned wanted anyway.

Then again, Ned is the buffoon who chose certain death when he still had the option of going to the wall to chill with his brother and the kid he loved as a son. He could have met Tormund. Honor and morals/ethics aren’t the same thing, Ned.

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Podo13 t1_ixjhoxg wrote

Well, remember, Jaime wasn't executed or banished or really punished in any way.

He was still a Kingsguard to Ned's best friend after killing the previous King, in by far the least noble of ways in their eyes, was an enormously pompous asshole from a family that was untouchable because of their wealth, and there were the obvious rumors that he was banging Cersei that pretty much everybody knew about.

Ned hated every fiber of Jamie's being, which led fed into his own faults as a human, and eventually led to his death.

Ned wanted Jaime to admit he killed the King just so he wouldn't die. But until Jaime did that, which he never would, all Ned could do was be an ultra-condescending asshole to a guy who was a huge, untouchable, prick.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixjmw6e wrote

I mean, I guess. I’m just avoiding my life responsibilities and kind of hovering around the idea that GRRM might have originally had other plans for Jaime that don’t bear out after other plot changes. D&D were seemingly perfectly content to let Nikolaj’s resemblance to Sawyer/Josh Holloway cue us into a bad boy redemption arc that wasn’t actually present in the script. (Nikolaj was perfectly cast as Jaime, but we all know that D&D never saw a shortcut they didn’t take.) You look at Jaime’s first appearance and you already know he’s an outward asshole with a tragic backstory and secret sensitive side. People who only watched the show have no idea that Jaime was talented, and it’s easy to lose track of the fact that he’s a contemporary to Ned and not Jon (though some of that is due to us seeing Charles Dance’s Tywin as Ned’s peer). TLDR I think Jaime is being kept around and strung along because he’s one of the few living nobles who was in KL and actually knows how Robert’s Rebellion played out.

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cchiu23 t1_ixj3l5p wrote

>Why didn’t anyone?

Oaths are super duper important

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Elcatro t1_ixkexae wrote

That's Ned's problem, he was too 'proper' and inflexible, everything had to be done right with him even when it made more sense to be underhanded for the greater good.

That's the whole point of his character, he could have won it all and avoided all the suffering that happens in the books after his death if he'd just been willing to bend just a little bit.

I think that's what George was getting at with him, he's the phrase 'The road to hell is paved with good intentions' personified.

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IndyRevolution t1_ixiamr8 wrote

You really wanna sit here and list of the menagerie of terrible things he did afterwards? Talking with show fans about Jaimie is insane. He's not a hero, despite the show writers trying to paint him as such, he's just a broken man trying to become a better version of himself, but he can only change so much. The books do a much better job of painting him as a vastly compelling wildcard compared to the "Jaimie's a hero cause he sorta feels bad about all the terrible shit he's actively assisting in" take the show goes with.

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Rawrfiend t1_ixixikx wrote

It might also be due to Nikolaj and how good of an actor he is. I feel like it's also easier to feel more towards a character you can see and hear versus the one you read. Jamie is by no means a good guy. In the books I can maintain my dislike for him. In the show I cannot.

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IndyRevolution t1_ixiaxpk wrote

Is he? He still blames Bran for "forcing" him to push him out the window and doesn't think of Tommen and Myrcella as his own kids. He's a better man than before, but he absolutely makes excuses for himself over and over and over in his brain.

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NamisteHome t1_ixjcw4e wrote

I knew a guy who had a cigarette buddy that would just sit there silently, mouth agape and jiggling his leg fit to shake the house because he's a fucking tweaker. But he'd been trained to be quiet and compliant because that meant his friend would continue to give him free cigarettes, junk food, and drugs just to exist and listen to him blame everyone else for his problems.

Sounds like Jaime is that kind of person.

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Existing-Boss-633 t1_ixjat83 wrote

I was happily surprised with Jaime’s character development in those books. Complicated and interesting characters are much more entertaining than 1 dimensional mustache twirling villains

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Krilesh t1_ixjkok3 wrote

i thought jaime is a great swordsman?

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TheTrueMilo t1_ixjnx3f wrote

He uh, gets a disability in season 3/book 3 that requires him to use his left hand instead of his right hand. He practices with Ser Ilyn to learn to use his left hand.

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ohgood t1_ixjswtp wrote

Repetitive stress injury, not just for typists! I’m sure he’ll be fine, just a couple months of physio and a wrist brace, right as rain

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SageOfTheWise t1_ixid2mh wrote

Yeah, having Bronn instead of Payne be Jaime's partner was totally fine (though what they go off to do is another story...), but it was really awkward how Arya just drops Payne's name from the death list she repeats every episode, despite the fact he's the one who literally killed her father. You aren't just going to forget about him.

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Jazzanthipus t1_ixiepad wrote

> J: What the hell was that?

> B: That was me knocking your ass to the dirt with your own hand

Bronn was arguably the best character in the whole show. Shame it got cancelled after only 4 seasons.

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ShemhazaiX t1_ixiln5p wrote

Holy shit there's a fourth season? Is that the whole House of the Dragon thing people are talking about?

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixiqcwr wrote

Yeah it’s a really short season that ends with the death of Oberyn Martell.

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DDFitz_ t1_ixiu6pt wrote

That's my favorite cut of the EU.

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Rawrfiend t1_ixixvbz wrote

I really wanted to see him perched up in High Garden or collecting on Tyrion and Jamie's heads. Shame.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixira5x wrote

Arya’s revenge stuff got so tiresome that I never even noticed that.

GRRM gives our POV characters perfunctory goals so they can serve their true literary purpose of observing new people and locations. The fact that the show bogged Maisie down with an annoying, repetitive arc instead of using her presence in Braavos to eavesdrop on politics or to play with the idea that the Faceless Men triggered the Doom and or explore their links to dragons…shows that D&D had a fundamental misunderstanding of the story they were telling. Like I’d bet a few dollars that Arya is going to return to Winterfell with intel about dragons, just in time to battle the Others.

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pravis t1_ixivsfc wrote

>The fact that the show bogged Maisie down with an annoying, repetitive arc instead of using her presence in Braavos to eavesdrop on politics or to play with the idea that the Faceless Men triggered the Doom and or explore their links to dragons…shows that D&D had a fundamental misunderstanding of the story they were telling.

Braavosi politics, Faceless Men links to the doom or dragons is nice world building that is best suited for a book not a TV show where it would just be wasting time on stuff or people that do not matter or help a character grow.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixj4eb8 wrote

Except that’s why Arya’s role in the White Walker battle was so weird. They didn’t give her the dragon knowledge, so they trashed a bunch of prophecies.

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pravis t1_ixj9kve wrote

Oh I agree Arya's story was handled poorly but it had nothing to do with not getting enough world building while in Braavos. She got her faceless man training and then skipped town which is all that was needed for the show.

They chose her to kill the night king for shock value when her story was probably better served trying to assassinate Cersei instead.

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manhachuvosa t1_ixjn7d0 wrote

Except the first seasons and HOTD are pretty great in giving people lore in an interesting manner.

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TempestaEImpeto t1_ixk02ja wrote

I mean, I don't think that's true at all. GRRM has said the Faulkner quote many times, to him the only thing worth writing about is the human heart in conflict against itself. You have a fundamental misunderstanding of the story GRRM is telling.

Arya is in Braavos because that's where she gets to stare directly at what dissociating from her identity and personality looks like, and the true nature of death, murder and her revenge fantasies, from which she's presumably gonna turn away from, I think. Not because Martin wanted to write about the Black pearl of Braavos or whatever.

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doesaxlhaveajack t1_ixk16gq wrote

You really didn’t grok onto the fact that Brienne’s function in book 4 is to take us on a tour of the countryside and to show us how the common folk are doing? You’re the one who made this personal, but you’re also wrong.

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Krilesh t1_ixjktei wrote

literally cant have her repeat these names ad nauseum and then expect audience to not notice if a box wasnt checked lol

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zorbathegrate t1_ixj1rd5 wrote

I thought the script was changed because of his cancer diagnosis.

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Rawkapotamus t1_ixl0x9w wrote

Payne makes very very brief appearances in the books for the training sessions but I absolutely loved them. He felt so cold and cruel.

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