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Post by min on Dec 14, 2016 4:35:01 GMT
Just want to revisit this again since I came across something interesting. My original argument was that even though Bran had a dream of seeing Ghost and talking to Jon while in the crypts of Winterfell; he had not yet crossed the Wall. It was unclear whether the crypt experience was an echo of something that happens to Bran after arriving at BR's cave since he appears to Jon as wierBran something that seems to be beyond his abilities before he crosses the Wall.
But do you recall the small but significant plot device where Jon is unable to sense Ghost when they are separated by the Wall?
How is it that Bran can sense Jon's presence within Ghost at all when they are separated by the Wall? Orell says that once an animal is bound to someone; any skinchanger can use that animal.
So I'm guessing this is how Bran is able to connect to Jon by touching Ghost. But if the Wall blocks that connection; then this can't originate with Bran within the Crypt. It has to be something that happens after Bran crosses the Wall; a future event that echoes to Bran's past.
Was there any other discussion about this plot device other than blocking Jon's ability to connect to Ghost. Any other purpose?
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Post by jnr on Dec 14, 2016 6:37:13 GMT
How is it that Bran can sense Jon's presence within Ghost at all when they are separated by the Wall? One explanation is that it's the same method that Bloodraven uses to enter Bran's dreams: the weirnet, Bran and Bloodraven both being greenseers. It seems the weirnet spans both sides of the Wall, and using it, greenseers can communicate with people in dreams no matter where they are. Notice that Bran appears as a weirwood when he shows up in Jon's dream. Notice that Bran also has dreams of a weirwood, calling to him, in the same book -- that is probably Bloodraven.
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Post by min on Dec 14, 2016 17:57:41 GMT
How is it that Bran can sense Jon's presence within Ghost at all when they are separated by the Wall? One explanation is that it's the same method that Bloodraven uses to enter Bran's dreams: the weirnet, Bran and Bloodraven both being greenseers. It seems the weirnet spans both sides of the Wall, and using it, greenseers can communicate with people in dreams no matter where they are. Notice that Bran appears as a weirwood when he shows up in Jon's dream. Notice that Bran also has dreams of a weirwood, calling to him, in the same book -- that is probably Bloodraven. Yes, I considered the wiernet crossing under the Wall. But what is the purpose of the small, but significant plot device other than to show us that Jon can't connect to Ghost when separated by the Wall. What I find curious is that this comes into play when Jon and Bran's timelines intersect. Bran is hiding at Queenscrown just before crossing the Wall and Jon has come over the Wall with the wildlings leaving Ghost behind. When Bran is in the crypts his third eye opened and he says he can connect to Summer at will and he can even connect to Ghost. So I take this to mean that he can also skinchange Ghost. Orell tells us that once an animal has been bound to a human; any skinchanger can ride the animal. If Bran is skinchanging Ghost at the Crypts; that ability should be blocked by the Wall. The same as it is with Jon whose encounter with WierBran at the Skirling Pass has also opened his third eye. The fact that Bran appears to Jon as a sapling wierwood growing in fast forward time is significant. Ghost's olfactory mapping also tells us where Bran is located and it's not the crypts of Winterfell: It's the cave of the Greenseer that Ghost smells. Warm brown earth, stone, tree and boy and wolf. The crypts are cold rather than warm. I think Ghost also smells the wights outside the cave entrance. The smell of death already encountered with Othor. This along with the weirwood sapling sprouting from bare rock and growing before Jon's eyes tells me that Bran doesn't contact Jon until he reaches the cave of the greenseer long after Bran and Jon cross paths. That what Bran experience in the crypts was a ripple in time or an echo of his future self. It seems to me that this is the purpose of the small, but significant plot device. To demonstrate that Bran moves through the river in both directions.
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Post by Melifeather on Dec 14, 2016 19:42:43 GMT
Well, I have speculated before that the ability for greenseers to "fly" means they can enter someone else's dream. Anywhere. So Bran could have entered Jon's dream. Jon on the other hand was dreaming he was Ghost, but he wasn't in Ghost. He was just dreaming he was Ghost and calling/howling to his siblings. At least that is how I understood that part of the dream. It's not until Bran helps Jon open his third eye that he's suddenly in Ghost looking over the cliff at the wildlings, but Jon and Ghost were both north of the Wall and with the Halfhand when Jon had this dream. So, Bran was already dream-traveling...flying, over the Wall and into Jon's dream.
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Post by freyfamilyreunion on Dec 14, 2016 20:30:34 GMT
It was my assumption that Bran is contacting Ghost/Jon while he is in Bloodraven's cave and not the crypts, by reaching back through time. Someone had an interesting theory, I can't recall if it was here or in Heresy, that the images of the glacier that Jon "sees" in his dream is an image that Ghost is seeing through his third eye because it doesn't seem that Ghost could physically be at the location of the vision. And Jon's subsequent vision of Bran is Bran contacting Jon through Ghost.
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Post by wolfmaid7 on Dec 14, 2016 22:30:25 GMT
I thought two things.Bran was on the Crypts and he used the flames that were there to reach Ghost.
The second i thought Bran hacked Ghost through his dream.He did say he touched Jon through Ghost.So Ghost dream was the conduit.Ergo he learned to Freddy Krueger.
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Post by min on Dec 15, 2016 0:30:37 GMT
It was my assumption that Bran is contacting Ghost/Jon while he is in Bloodraven's cave and not the crypts, by reaching back through time. Someone had an interesting theory, I can't recall if it was here or in Heresy, that the images of the glacier that Jon "sees" in his dream is an image that Ghost is seeing through his third eye because it doesn't seem that Ghost could physically be at the location of the vision. And Jon's subsequent vision of Bran is Bran contacting Jon through Ghost. Yes the business of touching to establish a connection is interesting. Quaithe touches Dany: Jojen touches Summer while Bran watches him in a wolf dream: WierBran touches Ghost/Jon: Then Jon has his flying experience. So this way of connecting to someone through their dreams involving touching or touching the third eye is interesting. But I'm still of the opinion that Bran doesn't appear as a weirwood until he is wed to the tree in BR's cave. It isn't until aDWD that Bran expresses the wish to help all his brothers and sisters learn to fly. This is much further in the future than the dream in the crypts. I think we'll also see that Marwyn established that same kind of connection with Sam when he grabbed him by the wrist and yanked him into the room with him.
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Post by min on Dec 15, 2016 1:02:49 GMT
The main question in all this is about Martin's small but significant plot device. In what way is blocking warg contact significant unless it has something to do with Bran's dream of Jon in the Crypts and touching Ghost/Jon at the Skirling Pass. Is it coincidental that Jon's separation from Ghost occurs just before Bran crosses the wall. Wouldn't this also apply to Bran attempting to contact John in a wolf dream separated by the wall? Am I making any sense? LOL Because if the plot device is only about Jon not being able to sense Ghost, so what?
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Post by jnr on Dec 15, 2016 4:38:59 GMT
Because if the plot device is only about Jon not being able to sense Ghost, so what? Well, just as an alternative view, perhaps there is a larger, more general principle. For instance: that the Wall blocks magic except for the weirnet. Now the Jon/Ghost link is just one expression of the idea, and you have to ask yourself all the other ways it might be expressed in the future storyline (or has already been expressed in the past).
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Post by min on Dec 15, 2016 7:15:55 GMT
Because if the plot device is only about Jon not being able to sense Ghost, so what? Well, just as an alternative view, perhaps there is a larger, more general principle. For instance: that the Wall blocks magic except for the weirnet. Now the Jon/Ghost link is just one expression of the idea, and you have to ask yourself all the other ways it might be expressed in the future storyline (or has already been expressed in the past). If Ghost belongs to the old gods; it could be that the direwolves are conduits of the wiernet themselves. Something that Bran embraces, but Jon does not. A Dance with Dragons - Jon VI
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Post by Weasel Pie on Sept 11, 2017 13:27:17 GMT
Some random thoughts to add to this one, since it's almost universally accepted now that Bran the Timelord is real. While I'm trying not to conflate the book with the show, the broad idea of Bran being able to go back in time, and sometimes screwing things up (Hodor) while he's getting the hang of it, are genuinely probable.
Going back to the OP, Bran is developing a crush on Meera as well as being very sneaky in his occupation of Hodor, which has the potential for some shocking moments. Both developments - Bran's infatuation with Meera and his secret skinchanging of Hodor - need to mean something to the plot, and in combination might be truly disturbing. I had a terrible thought about Meera being the woman who emerged pregnant from the pool, begging for a son to avenge her.
But Bran has alternatives in the works, both as love interests and skinchanging victims. One key point is that Bran will learn how to skinchange through the weirnet, and through time. I don't need to re-quote the dozen passages where Bran talks about wanting to be a Knight and bemoans his paralysis. And I think we're all familiar with how Bran, knowing that skinchanging a human was notgood, deliberately beats Hodor down to the point of Hodor's total subjugation. We're also told that creatures who have been skinchanged before are the easiest to skinchange. Logically, the experienced skinchanger will be able to wear down more difficult creatures... and humans. There is nothing to stop Bran from trying countless times to occupy anyone.
If our book Bran learns how to skinchange while his third eye is roaming through space and time, the sky's the limit on what he could do/who he might be. We've all wondered if Bran is actually all the other Bran's before him. There is significant circumstantial evidence that Bran is Bran the Builder, based on his academic knowledge of all of Winterfell's architecture, which is another block of exposition that needs to have meaning to the story, otherwise, why include it?
Further, he would be the founder of House Stark, architect of the Wall, Storm's End and the Hightower at Oldtown. The list goes on of course when you multiply this by all the other known (and unknown) Brandons.
But for our Bran to become the Bran of legend, he needs to complete his training and live his thousand lives. Say he learns - in his timeloop chamber - to occupy a wolf through the weirnet, or a raven. This would logically escalate to humans at a certain point, and it's still my belief that he would first try this with Hodor: a more fleshed-out and targeted skinchanging event that causes Hodor to be hodored. I think they went with a more subtle version of this event on the show for reasons.
Moving on, since we all know Bran wanted to be a Knight, why not skinchange a Knight? I speculate that Bran heard Howland Reed pray to the Old Gods, and occupied him as KotLT, with Howland easily a willing vessel.
My only concern is where GRRM could stop at this, since obviously Bran (and Bloodraven) can't be every single sketchy character in history.
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Post by Weasel Pie on Sept 11, 2017 13:39:10 GMT
So, bringing this back to the recent conversations about Brandon Stark - Ned's brother - possibly being Coldhands, I'd like to talk about Bran being Brandon, because it's more than obvious to me that Brandon is everything Bran would want to be, and if Bran wanted to move on from Hodor, Brandon would be the most attractive alternative.
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Sept 11, 2017 14:02:59 GMT
I'd like to talk about Bran being Brandon I have something for you on this that I think you will like a lot - it's what tripped me up last night in the other thread, but seeing your list of "Bran the Timelord" iterations made something click. It ties into timelordyness and incest. Will write it up at work today.
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Post by Weasel Pie on Sept 26, 2017 15:22:32 GMT
A little necro on this thread for some support of the notion that Bran is possessing people through the weirnet, and Bloodraven has been doing the same. Possible that the "fire and blood" sacrifice that Aerys needs to boink his wife is part of it? Dany is literally "child of three" and we could have the same for Tyrion and Jon of course. I've long thought that Aerys became "inhabited" by Bloodraven, and we've all recently discussed that "child of three" might mean one parent is being skinchanged. Just as Hodor's hodorism is likely caused by Bran mucking about with space and time - as you all may know, I think Bran was skinchanging Hodor through space and time, a much more severe trauma than is shown in the show - it's more than possible that Aerys went mad because of Bloodraven. Aerys and his fingernails Bloodraven growing into the tree
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Sept 30, 2017 18:15:11 GMT
I've long thought that Aerys became "inhabited" by Bloodraven, and we've all recently discussed that "child of three" might mean one parent is being skinchanged. Just as Hodor's hodorism is likely caused by Bran mucking about with space and time - as you all may know, I think Bran was skinchanging Hodor through space and time, a much more severe trauma than is shown in the show - it's more than possible that Aerys went mad because of Bloodraven. Gah! took me forever to find this post! Starting to think everything needs to be in a single forum. :\ Anyway, found this while looking around for something else: The Mystery Knight He remembered then. He was a holy man sworn to the Seven, even if he did preach treason. "His hands are scarlet with a brother's blood, and the blood of his young nephews too," the hunchback had declared to the crowd that had gathered in the market square. "A shadow came at his command to strangle brave Prince Valarr's sons in their mother's womb. Where is our Young Prince now? Where is his brother, sweet Matarys? Where has Good King Daeron gone, and fearless Baelor Breakspear? The grave has claimed them, every one, yet he endures, this pale bird with bloody beak who perches on King Aerys's shoulder and caws into his ear. The mark of hell is on his face and in his empty eye, and he has brought us drought and pestilence and murder. Rise up, I say, and remember our true king across the water. Seven gods there are, and seven kingdoms, and the Black Dragon sired seven sons! Rise up, my lords and ladies. Rise up, you brave knights and sturdy yeomen, and cast down Bloodraven, that foul sorcerer, lest your children and your children's children be cursed forever-more." Every word was treason. Even so, it was a shock to see him here, with holes where his eyes had been. "That's him, aye," Dunk said, "and another good reason to put this town behind us." He gave Thunder a touch of the spur, and he and Egg rode through the gates of Stoney Sept, listening to the soft sound of the rain. How many eyes does Lord Bloodraven have? the riddle ran. A thousand eyes, and one. Some claimed the King's Hand was a student of the dark arts who could change his face, put on the likeness of a one-eyed dog, even turn into a mist. Packs of gaunt gray wolves hunted down his foes, men said, and carrion crows spied for him and whispered secrets in his ear. Most of the tales were only tales, Dunk did not doubt, but no one could doubt that Bloodraven had informers everywhere. Obviously the underline is referring to Aerys I, but still....the wheel of time rolls around again. Whispering in King Aerys' ear... I also like the reference to the 'better' king across the water - a Blackfyre. Goes along with the Smiling Knight crackpot!
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