plans? Why didnt Renly bring Stark in on things, since he probably knew and had weeks of time being in the capital with Eddard but does basically nothing till Robert is dead. Or heck why not bring Jon Arryn in on the replace lannisters with tyrells plan?

Actually, Renly did sort of bring Eddard in on it, rather inadvertently:

Ned was not sure what to make of Renly, with all his friendly ways and easy smiles. A few days past, he had taken Ned aside to show him an exquisite rose gold locklet. Inside was a miniature painted in the vivid Myrish style, of a lovely young girl with doe’s eyes and a cascade of soft brown hair. Renly had seemed anxious to know if the girl reminded him of anyone, and when Ned had no answer but a shrug, he had seemed disappointed. The maid was Loras Tyrell’s sister Margaery, he’d confessed, but there were those who said she looked like Lyanna. “No,” Ned had told him, bemused. Could it be that Lord Renly, who looked so like a young Robert, had conceived a passion for a girl he fancied to be a young Lyanna? That struck him as more than passing queer.

See, here’s the thing about Renly and the investigation: it is not in Renly’s interest for the truth to come out unless and until he’s succeeded in getting Margaery into Robert’s bed. Because if the truth comes out and Robert is unattached, then Stannis becomes the heir to the Iron Throne.

However, if Robert is remarrying to Margaery, then the Tyrells replace the Lannisters in the King’s Landing power structure but because Renly’s brokered the deal and is romantically attached to Loras, they become allies to his faction. And while Stannis might temporarily be the heir to the Iron Throne, the moment that Margaery becomes pregnant, Stannis is out of the picture and Renly’s path to a Handship/Regency is clear.

So what’s happening above is that Renly is both trying to get info as to whether the Margaery as Lyanna 2.0 thing will work but also seeing if he and Ned are sympatico, and neither works. It previews Renly’s pitch to Ned, in that he completely misunderstands how to appeal to Ned and win him over.

As to why not Jon Arryn, well A. Jon Arryn suddenly dying kind of makes that impossible, and B. there’s no reason to assume that Jon Arryn would favor Margaery – he might push for some other marriage.

Do you think the reason Martin made Brienne so devoted almost pathetically to Renly was due to him wanting her to not seem perfect?

No, I don’t think that’s it. In chivalry, devotion to your liege lord is a sign of virtue; in chivalric romance, devotion to your love is likewise. Brienne’s case is rather efficient in that the two are one.

I think GRRM made Brienne devoted to Renly was to set up the idea that Brienne’s purpose in life is to protect others to the point of laying down her life in the approved fashion (”all his other knights wanted things of him, castles or honors or riches, but all that Brienne wanted was to die for him”), but that Renly wasn’t actually worthy of her service. Hence why Brienne spends all of AFFC looking for a maiden in need of defending, while slowly forgetting Renly and developing a deeper connection to Jaime.

Now, I have a darker guess about what Brienne’s endgame is than some people would like, but I think it’s definitely grounded in the rules and forms of chivalric romance and thus in Brienne’s character…

Chapter-by-Chapter Analysis: Catelyn IV, ACOK

“She thought she glimpsed movement, but when she turned her head, it was only the king’s shadow shifting against the silken walls. She heard Renly begin a jest, his shadow moving, lifting its sword, black on green, candles guttering, shivering, something was queer, wrong, and then she saw Renly’s sword was still in its scabbard, sheathed still, but the shadowsword…the steel of his gorget parted…

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