asoiaf read: notes on bran in a game of thrones

so i'm gonna try something.

i've recently decided that i was gonna read a game of thrones, but only the chapters told from the pov of female characters (and later, also bran), as well as doing it one character at a time. i read all of bran's last night and took notes on the things i noticed, so i'll post those here. i'll link to the synopsis of each chapter on a wiki of ice and fire so you can have context if you aren't a book reader, or just haven't looked at it in a while.

bran I:

• as bran is relaying the stories old nan has told him about the wildings, i noticed how westernized (southernized?) the descriptions of them were, and how they also seemed to be conflated with other "savage" or "barbaric" societies like the dothraki. it seems like there's a prevalent "all savages are the same" attitude, when it comes to the stories at least, where they demonize them by saying that they drink blood or are cannibals or own slaves. a very black and white view that erases the nuance of the situation with the free folk and erases the negatives of westerosi society, of which there are many.
• i noticed that bran is really perceptive to the way people change how they act in certain settings and situations, which he rationalizes as 'faces' (ex: father vs 'lord stark of winterfell', robb his brothjer vs robb the lord, etc). i wondered if maybe the other kids thought of it this way too, though i won't know until i read their chapters. with arya, in particular, this could be foreshadowing.
• i know nothing about swords, so idk how ice can be as big as robb and still be useable. it's much shorter in the show.
• this is something i've noticed throughout bran's chapters, but it came up here first: it's very unnerving how desensitized to death theon is. this comes from me being used to my own writing, but i also had to periodically remind myself how much older theon was, and that he came to winterfell at nine after having lived through a war.
• and of course i noted the dead direwolf scene, where the stag antler in the neck represents ned's death. i wrote that that was kind of a misdirect, since the person who killed him is a baratheon in name only, but i guess that's the point? also, joffrey never believed he was anything other than robert's son, as far as i know. and even though cersei had her hands all in it, jofffrey called the order. besides, i don't know if there are any lions in westeros anyway, especially north of the neck.
• also noted that the fact that the stark kids have to raise the pups themselves is foreshadwing to when their dad dies and they're all separated, having to fend for themselves.

bran II:

• bran mentioned that jon seemed to be missing the day of the hunt, but ned said that he wouldn't tell jon that he was allowed to go to the wall until the end of the visit so... is he just hiding or something? where's jon?
• i'm still confused at the fact that jaime is demonized for killing king aerys when people knew aerys was violent and cruel. maybe it's because i'm coming from a modern perspective? but i just don't see why he's seen as so bad for it. and i know people didn't know about aerys wanting to destroy the city during the sack, but still. i thought it was well known that aerys was a shit bag. what gives.
• i loved the HEAVY FORESHADOWING toward what was gonna happen to bran at the end of this chapter with all of the stories about how scared cat was of bran falling. establishing how good he is was good set up to them realizing something was up, though.

bran III:

• the 'fly or die' thing reminded me of harry's after death scene in deathly hallows for some reason. i linked the fact that bran was being given a choice to live or die with dumbledore telling harry that he can choose to take a train onward if he'd like. though, i know the circumstances aren't exactly the same.
• the amount of symbolism in bran's dream is STAGGERING:
• bran remembered jaime's face, but it seemed like the crow made him forget? i'm not sure he recognized it as jaime though, it just said s/t like "a golden face". but the crow did tell him to 'put it away' or s/t like that.
• it'd been a while since i read this, so i didn't notice that there was literally a storm over king's landing in his dream, even though the location wasn't specifically noted.
• the whole thing with the three shadows on the kingsroad has been talked to death, and it's pretty obvious that one is jaime and one sandor clegane, but i'm still unsure if the third is ser robert strong or not.
• are the 'dragons stirring beneath the sunset' dany's dragons? i was unsure b/c the line followed a mention of asshai, and i thought maybe they were somewhere else. idk.
• i wonder if bran saw where the others come from when he looked beyond the 'curtain at the end of the world'. i know that's what the crow was warning against. or maybe he just saw the others themselves. also: what the heck is the curtain at the end of the world?
• the three eyed crow/raven is definitely brynden rivers right? and the crow pecking at bran's forehead is him opening his third eye. just wanted to make sure i was clear on that.

bran IV:

• i noted bran's thing with faces again with the introduction of 'robb the lord'
• i made a note of the fact that it seemed like the show writers read tyrion's appearance in this chapter and based their whole read of him off of it.
• i noticed twice (here and in the next) that bran remembers certain things about his accident but has no context for them. in this one in particular, whenever someone mentions that he fell, specifically that, he blurts out that he never falls.
• when robb tells bran that they'll go to the wall to see jon, it'll be an 'adventure'. bran gets his adventure to the wall, but it's under very different circumstances.

bran V:

• the second thing i noticed: bran fears the lannisters but doesn't know why. again, he lacks the context to connect it to the fall. this also means that he might have known that that was jaime's face in the dream, or at least that of a lannister's.
• is the "dark wings, dark words" quote reoccurring? or is it just foreshadowing to the letter from king's landing in his next chapter.
• spoilers for a later book, but is the kyra from the winter town the same kyra that gets killed by ramsey snow?

bran VI:

• i wondered if the karstarks still counted as family, in reference to when robb kills rickard later, wondering of that counted as kinslaying still.
• i noticed that bran wasn't afraid of the weirwood tree anymore and how that was evidence of his emerging greenseer powers.
• i also wondered why robb didn't get betrothed before he went south, just because it might have stopped a lot of the trouble later with the freys. but hey.
• bran totally called the 'king's landing black hole,' which is the fact that 99% of the people who go to king's landing never come back home. the fact that anybody gets out is amazing every time.

bran VII:

• i wondered if the whole thing about bran fighting on hodor was foreshadowing to him being able to warg into hodor in later books.
• i also wondered if rickon sees the three eyed crow. he never mentions it, though.

and those are the notes. tell me if this is something you liked, if you don't mind. the next one will be catelyn.