The Silent Sisters Podcast

Looking forwards into 2024, we the Silent Sisters decided to look back at the year of 2023 for us. In this episode, we use the discussion of topics like technology, fanfiction, books, movies, TV shows, and more, to warm up for future episodes coming down the pipeline. At the same time, we took the opportunity to explore new soft- and hardware for recording. As a result, the audio quality is not up to our usual standards but we learned a lot and are ready to move forward.

Happy holidays, dear novices! The Sisters are taking some much needed chilltime for a very indulgent episode of one of our favorite ASOIAF topics: how amazing is Sansa Stark!?! Join us as we break down Sansa VI, AGOT, and her rising from the ashes of her father's execution and the completion of her book one arc. Of course, we couldn't forget about Sandor Clegane and the formation of an unlikely allyship in the face of abuse. His advice as a fellow survivor of IPV is important, but its listening to her own inner voice is a true moment of personal triumph over the king and his lackeys. And just one person showing they care in our darkest moments sometimes is all it takes to keep us from going over the edge.

How did we get to the end so fast? "The Black Queen" has finally arrived, and to help us ring in the season finale, we have our dear friend, Steven Stark, founder of the Here Be Dragons youtube channel and slack community. Join us as we discuss the audience as Mushroom, the fool court chronicler of Fire & Blood, and House Velaryon as the "swing house" and deciding factor in the black's response to Aegon's ascension. One thing is for sure, Princess Rhaenys was the key player in so many instances that we dubbed her "The Queenmaker" this episode. Rhaenyra has been crowned, men have sworn fealty to her, but that doesn't make the patriarchy magically disappear in her camp. It's a rough first 24 hours on the job for Rhaenyra, starting with grief over the deaths of her father and daughter, but also a tug-o-war for power with her Queen Consort. Clearly, Daemon had expectations of being the real shot caller behind the throne, which unfortunately leads to domestic violence. Finally, we get into the climactic horror of Arrax vs Vhaegar, how it happened, the theme of revenge and instant regret. Yep, Aemond really shit the bed this time, because he just unleashed The Black Queen. All this and more with Steven Stark as we unpack the harrowing finale to an amazing season of top tier television!

While LittleWolfBird lurks in the background, Blue Lemons holds down the fort as she, Lo the Lynx, and Akash discuss the Larys and Alicent foot scene from a sexual assault, disability, and shame persepective; Mysaria running for president in 2024, the return of the Shadow on the Wall, and her accent; and Alicent's pawn to player jouney via specific scenes including those with Rhaenys and Otto.

As our title suggests, we the Silent Sisters and their guest, artist Fox and Brambles, focus on four main parties: Rhaenys, the queen who never was, Alicent, the queen of Westeros, Viserys, the king of Westeros, and Daemon, the former and temporary king of the narrow sea. Beware, it is a heavy episode where we discuss losing loved ones in light of losing Viserys and we also examine Alicent's reactions to Prince Aegon raping a serving girl.

Well, we went from a family reunion for a funeral, to grand theft dragon (or not?), to a pint-size street fight where knife beats rock. Joining us to help us sort out this royal shitstorm is a good friend and fabulous fan fiction writer, Kitfics! This episode was largely about how many of the child characters are left alone to grieve the loss of a parent, some are only allowed to do so in silence. Likewise, we see the troubling behaviors and personalities developing between young Aegon and Aemond. Bad blood has already infected the next generation, which culminates in escalating violence until Aemond is permanently injured. All of what we see going on with the children makes sense when we parse out the parenting styles. Unfortunately, Alicent and Rhaenyra seem to be repeating lessons they learned in childhood from their fathers with their own children. We also examine Laenor's worsening melancholy and the need for Rhaenyra and Laenor to break the polycule to keep their vows to support each other. In a fun and wildly speculative segment, Blue goes full tinfoil hat about Alicent, which is precisely what happens when you let three fan fic writers run amok on a podcast.

Special Guest:

In an extraordinary first, the recording time of our coverage of House of the Dragon Episode 6 "The Princess and the Queen" ran so long, the only thing we could do was bring you a two-parter! And why was it busting at the seams with content discussion? This week's special guest Pat Sponaugle, everyone's favorite fandom dad, essayist, and commentator, made it wayyyyyyyyyyy too easy to get carried away! Big questions were asked and answered, even ones holding over from episode 5. Did Criston Cole murder Joffrey impulsively on perhaps a misunderstanding of Joffrey's intentions? Or was it far more calculated and intentially cruel than we initially realized? The ten year time jump is disected and critisized many times. Was it too much time to skip? Was it the right time to do the skip? Was there too much or not enough in this episode? No matter what, it is agreed apon that the cast, the crew, and the creators did a phenomenal job. Even after discussing ALL EIGHT children introduced this episode, there was still so much left that we wanted to talk about, so Pat graciously agreed to return to give us one more hour of hilarity and witty analysis. That will be coming up soon in part two. Bonus cameo appearance by Lisa Sponaugle and Chi-Chi the pug!

If last episode explored the themes of sex and pleasure, HotD S1E5 was all about love and marriage, with many proposals being made. Some dutiful, some taunting, and some... uh, romantic (???) but also really not. And since this is a patriarchy, these things can never be divorced (get it?) from gender and sexuality. Thankfully, we had our shining beacon of brilliance, Lo the Lynx, back with us to light the way. Join us as we discuss Viserys fighting through his declining health to get Rhaenyra to the altar, FINALLY. Power couple, Corlys and Rhaenys, share their hopes and fears for their children, revealing another layer to each of their characters. The inherant kindness and compassion in the way Rhaenyra and Laenor strike a pact to both do their duty and support each other's personal happiness in their marriage. It was beautiful to watch! We also discuss our parallel paramours, Ser Joffrey Lonmouth and Ser Criston Cole, and their very divergent attitudes towards the arrangement made by Laenor and Rhaenyra. The rift between Alicent and Rhaenyra widens as Otto Hightower poisons what's left of their friendship on his way out. Alicent doubles down on her conservativism and is the first to throw down the gauntlet of war with The Green Dress™. And things turn somber and sad as we must talk about what happened between Criston and Joffrey, the violence queer people face in real life, and our critique of how the show writers handled the manner of Joffrey's death as it relates to his sexuality.

Your High Heretics are soaring today because they got to sit down and chat House of the Dragon, Season 1, Episode 2 "The Rogue Prince" with none other than fandom icon, Lo the Lynx! Lo is best known for lending their expertise concerning issues of gender, sexuality, race, class, and disability as it relates to ASOIAF -- and boy, this episode gave us much to chew on! The conversation was FIRE, ya'll! Listen in as we talk about Rhaenyra getting ushered from the small council chambers, Rhaenys schooling her cousin on what it's like to be a would-be queen in a man's world, a gag-worthy proposal from Corlys, Mysaria's accent, the possibility of blood magic birth control, and everything Alicent. Thank you to Lo, who kept the Sisters on track and from going off on shiny new tangents.

Twas the night before episode 2 and all through the RSS feeds not an episode stirred, well all except your Humble High Heretics. Coming in at almost 3 hours, Blue Lemons and LittleWolfBird discuss scene by scene House of the Dragon Season 1 Episode 1 "The Heir of the Dragon". HBO packed a plump premiere with knights and dragons, plots and ambitions, and even a birth and bodycount. It only seems fitting that in accordance with such, we who keep silent have way too much to say.

In this last minute recording, household ASOIAF-fan artist Mallory aka Sanrixian and Zac and Hannah of Game of Owns fame join LittleWolfBird to talk about that D...dragons, we talked about dragons and the new dragon show coming to HBO this Sunday, August 21, 2022! LittleWolfBird read off a bunch of - but not even close to all - production crew names and their positions, including but not limited to Matt Smith's Stunt Double, the Blood Unit, the Covid Department, Payroll and Petty Cash, and an exciting revelation of a return crew member from Game of Thrones. Sanrixian talks about the dragons and the hope she has; Zac and Hannah reveal a George factoid; and LittleWolfbird talks about parrots. And of course, there is much discussion on favorite dragons and what we are most excited to see in House of the Dragon.

This time on TSSP, BlueLemons and LittleWolfBird get down to business and begin to tackle the traumatic past of Ned Stark. We say begin because well...we set out to examin the relation between Ned and Cat and had planned on just the one episode. But in the process of writing the script, the analysis of Ned and Cat ballooned out of control. "How out of control?" you ask? Listen to the episode to fine out.

Our first episode takes a look into the our history in the fandom and where we want to take this podcast.

The teaser episode for the all new podcast from The Silent Sisters. We will be putting out our first episode towards the end of January. So for now, tell your friends and get hype!