Hi,
just finished your last episode - I have to say: Pretty good. I really liked the idea that Mimi brought her medical knowledge into this episode. You once had an attempt of "character of the episode" - and I think your little discussion about Hodor, his Hodor, his family-background and his mental state was way better than all your former attempts on such a character spotlight. I know it was not really planned - but these are the situations when you often show your best performances.

I feel you should return to your "2 chapters per episode"-amount, that was/is normally a quite the right number. But I feel that the hosts really should try to read them (and the right ones), because although TotH is our beloved source for quick summaries, it is not enough for discussing the details (Idontlookatyoumimi). No offense - but I don't know how often anybody of you has said "WHat THIS chapter I thought it was THAT" and afterwards tried to follow the others while reading TotH.

Haha! You're absolutely right. coughmimicough. I need to read each chapter before we talk about them. Even on the 6th reread or whatever number this is for me I still pick up new things and now that Dance is out a reread shines even more new light on things.

Thanks Brynden!

So a quick reference in terms of the how many chapters re-reads you guys have left and the regards to the pace in which you release podcasts...

A Clash of Kings - 52 Chapters left to cover
A Storm of Swords - 82 Chapters
A Feast for Crows - 46 Chapters
A Dance with Dragons - 73 Chapters

Total of 253 chapters.

If say you average 12 reread chapters a year (HA!!!!) and do 2 chapters each podcast. That is 10 1/2 years (127 more episodes) of podcasting. (7 years (85 episodes) if you do 3 chapters)

Love the podcast.

P.S.
This is not intended on making any statement on the frequency of how often you guys are able to to put shows out. Do what you guys do. Just a funny thought on the possiblity of you guys still doing this 10 years from now.

So it really is a race with George then.

Interesting that Barrowton and our friend Barbrey Dustin isn't mentioned during the Lords of the North rollcall. I wonder if that means Martin hadn't conceived her as a character yet.

Is there any reason Hodor couldn't be mentally retarded AND have the specific speech disorder?

I gotta say, the evidence for Hodor being a descendant of Dunk seems super thin and honestly the evidence for Brienne isn't great either. Tall and Dunk was at Winterfell and tall plus shield. I guess we know Dunk was on the Kingsguard, but not that he was always on the Kingsguard, so he could have openly fathered children with his wife and then joined the Kingsguard if she died. Maybe? But I think it has to have been a secret kid, otherwise people would have said at some point "oh, of course Brienne of Tarth is huge. Her great-great uncle was Ser Duncan the Tall." It's a very ancestor-conscious society, after all.

I suppose I really should read those DUNK AND EGG stories at some point.

I'm holding out for the compilation myself......... hopefully I won't break and end up paying a ridiculous amount for several anthologies when I'll only read one story of each.

There are 'secret' places online you can read them for free... no idea how to find it anymore, but that's how I read them! I will buy them once they are in a compilation though.

I wouldn't be surprised if the "Brienne is descended from Dunk" theory were true, that it would be from her mother's side. Westeros is very ancestor-conscious, but the female line is still considered less important. Unless, of course, you are a Martell.

From So Spake Martin (things Martin has said) on Dunk's descendant:

Ask the right person via private message and you might be led to secret places...

Regarding Dunk's descendants. Maybe Martin is a very sly person and it is somebody very small?? But I think that would be too strange - even for Martin-genetics. After reading Amin's 2nd link I'm pretty sure it is Brienne - she took Dunk's shield.

Yeah I think that's pretty clear

Great episode. A few points were kind of rushed over:

Hodor is Old Nan's great-grandson. His grandmother could have been Tanselle 2 tall (or the tall girl in the Dance flashbacks).

Old Nan was brought to Winterfell as a wet nurse for an unknown Brandon. Her sons were killed in the wars and her daughters died.

Hodor's name is Walder. There seems to be only one family who would want to use that name... So Hodor's mom (Nan's granddaughter) likely knocked boots with the late Lord Frey.

Lady Hornwood didn't eat her fingers because of starvation. She was most likely being flayed and (according to Theon/Reek) the pain is so intense one would do anything to remove the flayed appendages. Likely she was trying to bite off her fingers since Ramsey was out of Tylenol.

Mors Umber's dragonglass eye can shoot laserbeams which can take out mass hordes of wights and others. Umbers are the kick-ass family of the north.

BAM!! Knowledge'd

Crazy necro bump, I know, but I found it amusing that one of today's top posts on reddit was about Hodor's aphasia:
http://np.reddit.com/r/AskSocialScience ... as/cie0cjz

Mimi's pseudo-medical knowledge for the win!