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Do you think GRRM’s claim “Anyone can die, even the heroes” is true? After all, Ned was only the main character of the first book, so he’s obviously not the hero of the story. Robb and Cat died, but they’re not important characters and Robb wasn’t even a POV character. Jon died, but he’s sure as hell going to be resurrected. So, if neither Jon, Tyrion or Daenerys die before Book 7, does it mean GRRM was bluffing?

That’s a rather presentist way of looking at it, no? When the first book was all there was, Ned was the main character, and he died. That hadn’t really happened before in genre fiction. 

Robb and Cat were hugely important characters, the driving force of House Stark’s war effort, and we can tell from the impact that their death had on entire kingdoms. 

Add to that the death of Khal Drogo right when we thought he was about to invade the Seven Kingdoms, the death of Renly when it looked like the war was his to lose, the death of Tywin at the height of his power, or the death of Oberyn on the brink of victory…the list goes on and on. 

Matt Asks: House Guardsmen

This may have been asked before, but the Great Houses at least (Stark, Lannister, Baratheon, Arryn, ect) all have large bodies of Guardsmen (who I assume are the equivalent of men-at-arms at least) who seem a separate class from household knights. 

Would these be the equivalents of personal retainers for these Houses, and do any ‘lesser’ Houses have them?

Pretty much all noble houses above the lowly position of Ser Eustace Osgrey have guardsmen – in fact, they’re obligated to have them, as part of their feudal contract to supply fighting men to their liege lord. 

Take Rohanne Webber, for example. House Webber is a minor house, a vassal to a Lesser (though principal) House, with one modest castle and ~60 tiny villages worth of peasants. And yet Lady Webber can assemble 33 fighting men, including six knights and six squires (plus Longinch), a dozen mounted crossbowmen, and nine men-at-arms, without calling a general levy. 

Is it impossible for Cersei (in the show) to simply un-arm the faith? She was trying to get them to bless Tommen in the books, but it doesn’t seem like she really needed them all that much in the show. Couldn’t the King just outlaw it or take it back? Or am I trying to look for logic where there is none? (Namely on GOT itself.)

Once you’ve armed them, it’s going to take a war to disarm them. Both in the books and the show, the Faith Militant do not give a damn about secular authority and are eager to die fighting for their gods. 

And in the show, Cersei needed them as part of her scheme to imprison Margaery. 

If the Starks have been aiming to contain the Boltons for thousands of years, why not just… you know, kill them all? They’ve had thousands of years to do it and there’s never been a single Bolton that was more decent than Roose or Ramsay.

Because exterminating an entire House, men, women and children all, is normally seen as tyranny; hence why everyone started seeing Aerys II as mad after the Defiance of Duskendale. And while it may cow your bannermen (see the Rains of Castamere), fear only goes so far as a motivator. 

But this line “there’s never been a single Bolton that was more decent than Roose or Ramsay” is complete hogwash. Yes, many if not most Boltons have been vicious brutes. But Domeric was a perfectly normal human, and I’m willing to bet there have been others before. 

What are thoughts on spiderman one more day, along with your opinion on whether or not spiderman should be married?

One More Day is a train derailing and then wrecking into a garbage fire, all for the sake of rebooting continuity back to when Joe Quesada was a kid reading comic books, which is not a good idea if you want to inspire the current kids to read comic books. 

I’m firmly in the Claremontian camp of organic character development – characters should have a chance to mature and change like real people, and that includes Peter Parker. 

And one of the great things about the Marvel Universe is that you can do that while still giving people different versions of the same superhero, because Spiderman and Peter Parker of Earth 616 aren’t necessarily equivalent.

If you want a Spiderman struggling with high school and teenagerdom, try some Miles Morales or maybe some Spider-Gwen. If you want something really different, like giant mechas or noir pulp heroes or Spiderhams, there’s an entire Spiderverse to pick from. 

Graphic Policy Radio on Captain America: Civil War (Part 1): Comic vs. Film

elanabrooklyn:

Hey guys! So our first of two podcasts about Civil War is up! This is the one for comics readers with resident Captain Americalogist, historian  @racefortheironthrone as our guest.

You’ll get to hear my list of the 3 good things about Millar’s Civil War comics!

Yup, there were only 3 good things. 

Luckily the movie is much much better.

We would love to hear your thoughts about the movie and the movie vs the highly mediocre comics. 

Listen to us online.  Or you can subscribe to Graphic Policy on iTunes  or Soundcloud

Graphic Policy Radio on Captain America: Civil War (Part 1): Comic vs. Film