Hey everybody, happy new year! So 2016 has come to a close so it's time to talk about all
the dead characters on Game of Thrones that we want back.
So this is going to be my top 10 list and I know you're all wondering about when the
next trailer is going to come.
So I tried to include some of that at the end of this too.
Just careful for spoilers for everything that's happened on the show so far, and there is a new
round of the Game of Thrones giveaway. They just released enhanced editions of the book,
so, it's basically for the value of those enhanced editions.
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So a lot of times characters are killed off in big twist moments to shock the audience
to remind you that no one is safe.
Anybody can be killed.
Sometimes they're killed off because the writers write themselves into a corner and they can't
think of anywhere else to take the character, and sometimes they're killed off because they're
overpowered or they have too much knowledge and they become a crutch for other characters
to lean on - that the writers don't want the other characters to have.
So Barristan Selmy for instance was a crutch for Daenerys to lean on.
He had so much experience,
so much knowledge. He knew all about Rhaegar Targaryen somebody who we need a lot more
information about, so naturally the writers took him away.
So let's go through this list, and all explained for the characters on the show that are dead,
but are still alive in the books, why it is I think that they killed them on the show.
The quote from George RR Martin says it all - 2016 was directed by me. I'm sorry. So,
so many people we've lost,
so let's remember some of the really cool ones.
Number 10 - Doran Martell, an amazing book character but was probably killed off on the show because
the writers wrote themselves into a corner with the Dorne storyline.
It's a really big storyline in the books, but on the TV show they don't have that much
time to focus on it.
So it seems like they were just stepping around it because they wanted to use a couple of
the Sand Snake characters but they had all this stuff that was happening down south and
they needed to find a way to not have to go back there on a regular basis to explain what
was going on.
So naturally, if the Sand Snakes were on the loose, he would've sent an army after them
to stop them from causing more chaos.
So what do you do, you have to kill him.
So it totally sucks.
This also had the unintended consequence of making the Dorne storyline even more hated
than it already was.
So even though "Game of Thrones" is an amazing show,
not all the storylines shine like Lannister gold. Every once in a while they run into problems
just like any other TV show. So may you rest in peace Dornish master plan. In the books,
the idea of the Dornish master plan is that Doran was secretly working as part of this
conspiracy to put a Targaryen back on the throne and was arranging to have one of his
children, Quentyn, marry Daenerys to form an alliance.
But like the TV show changing things from the books, Quentyn was excised from the story,
Trystane was murdered by the Sand Snakes trying to end the Martell regime. It seems like there
aren't any Martells left, so who has power now, the Sand Snakes? Is there open revolt in
the streets?
We have no idea. Number nine - Shireen Baratheon, this is one of the saddest deaths on the
show. But it proved great fuel for Ser Davos to go after Melisandre. So, she's still alive
in the books, but it sounds like she might meet the same fate.
The reason that Dan and Dave said that they killed her off on the show in the way that
they did, like having Stannis execute her as an offering to the Red God to ensure their
victory, which didn't really come, at least not the way they expected it against the forces of
the Boltons, is because they felt like Stannis had crossed the line and was committed to
his cause.
He was so stubborn that he was not going to waiver.
So when Melisandre put it to him,
we need royal blood,
he offered up Shireen. The reason I think they couldn't use his wife Selyse is because
her blood did not flow from Stannis as that was the whole idea of the king's blood flowed
through Shireen's veins because it came from Stannis.
So, it was mostly a death that was born out of the logic of Stannis's course on the TV show
and provided like a really big shocking moment in sort of the first ice block in the giant
wall that was Melisandre misinterpreting visions and her perceived downfall.
She's down but not out.
We'll have to talk about Melisandre stuff in another video because she was still effective
in bringing Jon Snow back from the dead.
So she does have power, but she misinterprets her visions.
So sadly led to Shireen being sacrificed. Number eight - Barristan Selmy, another really terrible
death, he's an amazing character that's still alive in the books. He's supposed to have his
own POV chapter during "Winds of Winter". The problem is that he was this huge crutch for Daenerys,
like I said.
So the writers wanted a big shocking moment they wanted her to feel alone, so they took
that away.
So, that was sort of paving the way for her new small counsel with Tyrion to come in.
So we're starting to see this thing where, you know, Daenerys has three dragons, she has this very
good advisor Tyrion, but slowly and slowly she's gotten more and more powerful.
So the writers have started to take stuff away from her. That might continue into season seven
If she seems invincible,
there's no way that's gonna last. So, whatever her crutches, her dragons, her advisors, those
will slowly go away over the course of the next two seasons.
It would really suck if my 2017 "Characters That We Want Back" list included a dragon on
it. But number seven - The Blackfish went out like a champ. I know a lot of people are like,
hey we didn't see a body, he's not dead.
The idea was, is that he was going to fight off the Lannister army 'til he was killed.
Jaime didn't really have much use for The Blackfish because Edmure controlled the castle
and he had capitulated.
So the Lannisters were already in control.
So this is another one of those Stannis-type death moments, where they imply that he's going
to be killed.
But they don't just out right show it to you.
So you're just left to wonder.
I think The Blackfish is dead - I think that was the whole idea of that last scene with Brienne.
So may you rest in peace Blackfish - you sass like a champ!
He was one of the funniest, most Monty Python things about the season. So, number six -
Mance Rayder - we have not seen him in a while, but he is so much cooler in the books. He becomes
a much bigger part of them trying to retake Winterfell from the Boltons.
He infiltrates it using "glamour".
So the only thing the show has done with glamour thus far is just show us Melisandre's jewel.
Just show us like the 200-year-old lady that she really is,
even though she's been using that jewel to stay young.
That's part of the glamour process - like you have to have that next to your skin in order
for it to work. But the show probably killed Mance off because it wasn't going to be doing
a lot of his storyline.
There were just a lot of characters involved in that northern plot that they weren't going to
do on the show.
So there wasn't much reason to keep him around.
They didn't want him to be as grand of a figure - they wanted the conflict between the brotherhood
and the Wildlings to devolve into Jon Snow's death.
So if Mance were still around,
then that probably wouldn't have happened, like he probably would've helped keep things under
control. So, number five - Maester Aemon, a Targaryen alone in the world is a terrible thing. So
he was another one of those characters
that was a crutch for Jon Snow to lean on. He's on his path to becoming a leader in his
own right.
So naturally, like Daenerys lost Barristan Selmy, Jon Snow lost Maester Aemon, may he rest
in peace. The actor playing him also passed away after they had filmed most of his scenes.
So it was very sad, but he lived a very long life.
Maester Aemon, even in the context of the show, had lived an extremely long life. He has this
really interesting backstory that I'll do another video sometime soon, but his brother
was Egg from the "Dunk and Egg" series who ascended the Iron Throne because Maester Aemon was in line
ahead of him, but chose to abdicate because he didn't want to create another Targaryen civil
war, where all of his brothers would end up dying.
So he took the black, went to the wall, became a maester. That is kind of fun to think about,
what would that have looked like, Maester Aemon sitting on the Iron Throne. Number four - Stannis Baratheon.
A lot of people were really upset when the show killed him off. He's still alive in the books.
They're getting ready for sort of their episode nine, "Battle of the Bastards"-type episode.
But in the books I'm referring to it as the Battle of Winterfell, Stannis is getting ready
for that, but ultimately I think, you know, because he's not destined to sit on the Iron Throne,
he will be killed off of eventually.
So the show was just making a beeline for that. Stannis, as Melisandre believed it, was
not the "Prince who was Promised". That is someone else, she starts to believe in Jon Snow, that
he comes back, and now it seems like that's him.
He's the one that's destined to rise up. So, the question now remains, how is Stannis going
to die in the books? Is it gonna happen in a similar way? Will he fall?
He was one of the best characters on the show, even though he was an asshole 'til the day
he died.
He was just so much fun.
But, number three is Catelyn Stark, for obvious reasons, for Lady Stoneheart reasons.
So it'd be amazing to have that character on the show, but I think, you know, because they didn't want
too many people coming back from the dead to spoil the Jon Snow reveal, they just decided
to cut her out of the show.
She also takes control of the Brotherhood in the Riverlands. It becomes this big storyline.
The TV show wanted the Brotherhood to head north.
They wanted Brienne's storyline to take place with Sansa.
So the writers said, behind the scenes, she was never in any conversations to ever come on
the show.
So it wasn't like they were almost going to do her and then decided not to. They just immediately decided
that when Catelyn Stark died, that was it, she wasn't coming back.
So, she's a really awesome character in the books. We can totally talk more about her when
the next book comes out,
see were her storyline goes. But number two is Ned Stark. We kind of did get him back,
but not in the way we expected. He's one of the few characters on the show, and in the
books, that's in on one of the best well-kept secrets in the kingdom - who are Jon Snow's
parents?
What does that mean for the story? Would it throw the kingdom into chaos?
So, of course the character that knows everything dies off and now it seems like Bran is the
path to them learning about that. So they haven't confirmed whether or not the actor the plays
Young Ned Stark is going to be coming back for season seven. He could totally come back,
it just depends on how they're going to treat more flashbacks on the TV show, and which characters
they would need for that. Because there are a couple key characters, including my number one: Rhaegar
Targaryen, the one person that we've heard a lot about, but have not seen yet. So there've
been numerous storylines that have called him out - Daenerys learned about him through Barristan Selmy,
we learn a little bit about him through Robert Baratheon's storyline in the
early seasons of the show, and then now, even though the show's only implied it, you know behind the
scenes, HBO sort of unofficially confirmed Rhaegar Targaryen is Jon Snow's father.
So, it just blows your mind and blows the story wide open, because you start to see Ned Stark's
motivation for keeping it secret for so long.
So, he's just a character who is dead now that we really want back so that we can see some
of this play out. Because it's some of the best drama ever, and it's something that fans have
been waiting for since 1996 when the first book was published.
That's where Ned Stark has the dreams were he dreams about the Tower of Joy. You get the first
glimpse of what this scene is right here - the scene that Bran flashes back to. So that's
how long people have waited to get more information about Lyanna Stark, Rhaegar Targaryen, and Jon Snow.
So let me know in the comments, who are the dead characters that you really want back on the
TV show?
It doesn't even have to make sense - you know, most of the characters that are alive in the books
that are dead on the TV show were killed off for around about reasons. But like George RR Martin
says you know 2016,
directed by him.
I'm sorry, there's a lot of death in "Game of Thrones". So a lot of that is just to show you
the casual nature of death in that world.
Nobody is safe.
Anybody can be killed off.
It doesn't matter how special you think you are - just remind you of your own mortality.
So, if there are any bonus videos that you guys want me to do, for say like Maester Aemon, the
Targaryens, or anything from Game of Thrones history, just let me know in the comments.
So I'll say congratulations to this week's giveaway winner, the Promethean. You won $20 Amazon
gift card. Please private message me on the back end of my channel so I can get your contact
details.
So there's a whole bunch more stuff coming in the next couple of days.
We got some teasers for season six
around this time last year.
I'm not expecting a season seven teaser for at least a little while longer.
Maybe when we get closer to the Super Bowl.
But typically game of thrones doesn't advertise in the Super Bowl.
But they might choose that time to release something out into the wild.
Just like, hey remember this is the show.
Please don't forget about us. So there might be some new footage coming soon, but I'm not
expecting an official trailer for a little while. While you guys wait for my next video to post, you
can click here to learn all about Aegon the Conqueror's history,
and you can click here to learn all about Deadpool in the Wolverine movie.
Thank you so much watching, happy new year, everybody let's high five,
I'll see you guys tonight!