Skip to main content

game of thrones - How could Ser Jorah Mormont "find out" about the Second Sons?


In the TV adaptation, Game of Thrones, in the third season in the seventh episode, Daenerys and her Unsullied are parked outside of Yunkai. The messenger from the city comes to offer them gold and ships if they are willing to go away.


Alas, the mother of dragons cannot see people in chains, so she decides to put an unreasonable ultimatum so she will destroy Yunkai.


The ambassador, in return, says that they have friends who will put her army to death with great pleasure. After he leaves, Daenerys speaks with Ser Mormont about these "friends". She asks who they might be, and he says that he doesn't know. Her reply is for him to find out.


How? How would he find out? Would he knock on the city doors and ask people who are the mercenaries kept on retainer by the city leaders? Will he take out his smartphone and search on Google (I bet there's reasonable reception nearby such a glorious city)? Or in a classic Mel Brooks moment, he'll take out the script and search for the answer in the script?


Okay, all the above are fairly preposterous. But it serves to illustrate the point. It doesn't seem reasonable that he can "find out" in any way that doesn't involve engaging in war with the mercenaries to begin with...


Can anyone give a plausible explanation as to how he found out the answer without resorting to the above options?



Answer



About 5 minutes into the next episode: episode 8, season 3, Daenerys, Ser Jorah and Ser Barristan are standing behind some rocks looking at a group of warriors riding by:




Daenerys: Do you know them?
Ser Jorah: Only by the broken sword on their banners (*). They're called the Second Sons. They're lead by a bravoosi named Mero -- the Titan's Bastard.



(*) Confirmed on the wiki: The banner of the Second Sons is a broken sword.


So that is the answer in the TV-show, clearly: They find out in the next episode when Ser Jorah recognizes them. Back when Daenerys first asked Ser Jorah, there was no one there but the emissary from Yunkai, so he could not see them to recognize them.


Ser Jorah has spent a long time in Essos, selling his sword and travelling. He has lots of knowledge about Essos culture and factions. This is known from very early in the books, when we get to know Ser Jorah's tragic history. But I do not believe it is until A Dance with Dragons that we hear that he was once riding with the Second Sons.


I do not have a relevant quote to prove it, and I do not believe there is a good, short quote, but it is clearly described in Jorah's wiki page. It was more of a thing of Ser Jorah and the captains recognizing each other.


To be clear, just because Ser Jorah's affiliation with the Second Sons is in the books does not mean it should be in the TV-show, and Ser Jorah never lied to Dany about it in the books.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Do the Kwikspell courses work?

In Harry Potter we are introduced to Kwikspell course in The Chamber of Secrets (and never hear about it again). We see Filch taking courses, presumably by mail. The descriptions of Kwikspell make me think it is for people who are weak in magic (kind of like how Neville was supposed to be when he was younger), but had magic in them nonetheless. However, Ron's comments later in the chapter make it sound like it is mainly for Squibs to learn magic. However, it is strongly implied through out all the books that Squibs are essentially Muggles, and will never be able to do magic. How then is a Kwikspell course supposed to work? Do we have any information to know if it works at all? Is it a scam? An answer from any level of canon is welcome. Answer Kwikspell courses are (probably) useful to some wizards, but not to squibs. The Kwikspell course literature comes with two testimonials. Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes: ‘I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke...
Post a Comment
Read more

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...
Post a Comment
Read more

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...
Post a Comment
Read more