I think Twyin is one of those types who have to see it to believe it, in his mind Dany's dragons he assume was as small and harmless as the last dragon kept under the pit, i think he'd realize how much of a threat they were if he had been there to witness Drogon in battle.
He knew that if dragons were actually back like they were during the conquest, then resisting would be hopeless. Tywin isn’t the type to be hopeless, so he convinced himself that the dragons were tiny and insignificant.
Gods, I wish Tywin would have lived until The Others, giants, and dragons were seen in King's Landing or Casterly Rock - - if only to see his reaction.
Tywin just doesn't have the time to give credit to magical beasts that are supposed to be dead. I'm sure at their existence was still normal he would probably throw all of his children at any unmarried dragon rider😄
Yep I fully agree and I think part of him wasn't wanting to accept the truth cause he knew he'd be absolutely screwed, there wouldn't be anything that could save him. His army couldn't save him, a marriage couldn't save him, and bending the knee wouldn't save him (obviously because he helped overthrow the mad king, regardless of how and he was, his kids and grandkids didn't deserve to be hunted like dogs along with everyone else related to him and we know he had a hand in it) Dany wouldn't have accepted anything from him except his surrender to which she'd still kill him
@@afibuffygirlThat would be a pretty Hard pill to swallow that that the family you thought you dealt with forever was now being led by a thirteen year old girl who brought back magical flying monsters that could destroy your life's work😄
The Dornish were the only people to successfully resist against dragons. That’s why they kept the title prince. Because they married into the seven kingdoms and weren’t conquered.
@@EtiennejinThe thing is, before the peace was accepted by the conquerors, Dorne almost ceased to exist, every castle and fortress was Burned in there. Doran Martell later says even to this day Dorne is still recovering from the war 300 years ago
In reality, there were factions other than the dornish who resisted dragons. People forget that the Triarchy held their own and sacked spicetown against an army with *many* dragons.
The dumbest thing he did was constantly ostracising Tyrion imo. If he could see past the dwarfism and what happens to his wife they would have won the game of thrones
@@RealCodreX I mean yeah but they are established now. Post Jaime losing his sword hand Tyrion was easily his best ally. Someone said it in another RUclips GOT thread. Tyrion is loyal, smart, cunning, and dying for his praise. Unfortunately I believe he has hate for Tyrion he can never let go of. But it’s amazing his love for his late wife is enough for him to keep Tyrion alive .
Would you care about poison in your soup when you have a knife at your throat? I think it was that kind of situation. He had to focus first on the enemies right in front of him.
He didn't even attempt to find out if the rumours about dragons were true (which wouldn't cost him anything), let alone take any precautions. He certainly did not believe dragons could exist. He was incapable of accepting the world as anything other than what he imagines it to be in his own mind. Tyrion being someone's bastard and the murderer of his wife, his children never having an affair with each other, etc. If he believed the sun rose from the west, no evidence would be able to convince him otherwise. Just textbook psycopath behavior.
I think him mistreating Tyrion was the dumbest thing he did. He didn't have to like Tyrion but abusing him like that finished him and his house. I hope Joanna gave him a good lecture in the afterlife
It is dumb and it was his downfall. For a man who was so obsessed with furthering his family's position, the son he badly wanted, who would have furthered his house incredibly well, was the son he didn't want.
People today have trouble understanding cultural nuances from just 10 years ago. Can you imagine what it must be like if someone told you magical dragons live 300 years ago without much hard evidence.
I mean They have their skulls and the last few centuries of Westerosi history and that of its major houses were basically decided by dragons It's as believable as the Roman Empire or the Cambrian period
To be fair at this point in the story all they have in Westeros are rumors about Dragons far to the east, obv we as the viewers/readers know that they are real but I feel like most reasonable people in Westeros would dismiss Dany's dragons as just being a fake sailor's tale
@@adrianshantz5740this is what I'm saying. Hearing a wild rumor about something that as far as you know has been gone for well over a century sounds less like some kind of miracle for your enemy and more like an attempt at scaring you with propaganda. Of course he was wrong but can you blame him for not thinking Magic was real?
@@badjuju2721 The show also does a terrible job at conveying how far Mereen is from Westeros. Mereen is thousands of nautical miles away, it would take you around 3 months to sail from Mereen to Westeros, weather permitting, and at least another month extra to sail there from Qarth where the dragons were hatched. So even like Varys, who has little birds immediately reporting on everything Dany does, is always behind by a few months on his info. In the books even these sailor's tales about dragons don't start to reach Westeros until ADWD after Tywin is already dead
Actually it was super consistent with his character. During a conversation with Arya at Harrenhall, he couldn't even name Aegon the Conqueror's sisters. Which shows an irony that a man obsessed with lineage and legacy doesn't know a lot of history.
I think that is more that he doesn't think the wives of Aegon, bore much consideration and plays into how he perceives women and their role in the seven kingdoms. He hates Tyrion, but favours Tyrion being hand, over his Daughter, who he (rightly in her case) believes incapable of good rule.
That’s not true lol 😂🤦🏾♂️ he’s trying to make lannisters history when he was talking to Arya he was picking her brain that’s why he asked follow up questions about her parents
This and I think, after Aerys' ballyhooing of the BLOOD OF THE DRAGON REEE for as long as Tywin was Hand of the King, probably drove Tywin to be practically ignorant of Targaryen legend
I think you've missed the point entirely. Tywin wasn't saying that the dragons were no threat, he's making the point that Dany was rallying more and more troops to her cause because her dragons. In the sacking of Mereen or Yunkai the dragons had minimal involvement. The idea of dragons was much powerful to people, than the actual dragons themselves, Tywin knows that if he can beat Dany, it has to be by keeping more and more people loyal to the crown, and causing dissent in her ranks. Tywins clever actions here caused Dany to dismiss her strongest and loyalest protector at the time, if you remember.
This is just a case of Tywin’s ignorance of Dragons. He’s never lived through a Dragon onslaught, so he wouldn’t have any experience in dealing with or properly judging them. Had he been around for Daenerys’ Dragon’s Growth and her eventual traveling to Westeros, Twyin would have changed his tune and tried to bargain with Daenerys.
He wouldn't have been able to do shit with bargaining with dany .He sealed any hope of negotiations with a potential targaryen resurgence when he ordered rhaegar's wife and kids to be murdered like dogs . It would be quite the understatement of how screwed him and his house would be if he knew the truth ,all the work that he has ever done is just bound to be undone by a 13 year old girl at that
I think it also put into perspective that people during this specific period just could not comprehend the power and destruction a dragon brings to the table since they’ve only ever been nothing more but stories of the past in their lifetime. It could also be Tywin in such deep denial of the fact that no matter how smart or strategic in battle you are an atom bomb will still always win.
He literally used the dragons to bring Oberyn Martell (and dorne) back in the fold by offering him a seat in the small counsel, because Dorne was the only Kingdom that resisted Aegons conquest. (R.I.P. Meraxes)
Even Joffrey knew Daenerys and her dragons were a threat and Tywin still dismissed it. The only thing he was worried about was that Ser Jorah was working for Daenerys so he arranged to get him kicked out. After that he assumed Dany's army would collapse
People also need to remember that dragons also got smaller, and smaller, and smaller over time. They have a discussion about the skulls considering it. Tywin definitely underestimated them, but given the information he had, he was working on logic. Dragons hadn’t won a war in such a long time because the ones that existed right up until the end were especially small and would never pose a threat. I’m sure his attitude would’ve adjusted knowing how big they got.
I wish we could have seen his reaction to seeing the dragons. Even just seeing the damage that Drogon did to Jamie’s army would have blew his mind lol.
I think what he meant was that dragons haven't been around for 300 years. Armies have been around before and after (all the time) dragons have died out.
More like saying they haven't won a war in 180 years, because Tywin is timeline wise severly off with the last dragon dying about 150 years before this.
I like to believe he was just downplaying the threat in front of the council but backstage he's still trying to get additional intel to assess the threat and constantly receiving uodates.
Tywin undermines the power that comes with dragons. Look where they got Dany! Even WITHOUT them she was still magical and powerful but WITH them she got her Unsullied Army, she conquered Mereen, Yunkai and many other things she did. She freed people and they CHOSE to follow her. The dragons are capable of burning ARMIES and even DESTROYING Kings landing. One dragon alone did this now imagine 3? He thinks too highly of himself here and that was HIS mistake and he passed that onto Cercei and Jamie who underestimated HER. She burned Jamie’s troops and then ended Cercei and Jamie with ONE dragon. Let that sink in. Read that again.
I would have seriously loved to see all 3 dragons at the end. It would have been so powerful. Even when there were 2 and they were burning the undead it was epic. Cersei got into her mind that one dragon wasn’t as much of a threat as 3. Clearly we saw she was very mistaken 😂
The later day dragons were all tiny, and useless in war. I think that reputation remains a bit, where people know what dragons were, but likely that these three new dragons are gonna be more like the smaller, quite useless ones
You're missing the point of Tywin's statement. He's doing what he always does: projecting the image of power, confidence, and control. He needs to appear powerful to be powerful, that's the whole point of his style of leadership: rule through fear, I'm the strongest house, don't cross me or else, etc. Deep down, he's plenty smart enough to know he's f'd the second Danny lands in Westeros with her dragons, but he needs to downplay the threat to the Small Council (and Joff) to make it seem like he has everything well in hand, reality of the situation be damned.
Title is clickbait. I Tywins perspective, dragons do not exist anymore. He is one or the most powerful human individual in Westeros and has achieved everything through strategy, military and first and foremost gold. This statement is anything but stupid.
Tywin is one of my favourite characters but he does suffer from lack of judgement from time to time; Him considering an alliance with the wildlings against the North and plotting to make that incompetent lickspittle Slynt the Lord Commander of the Night's Watch is another one that has always struck me as strangely short-sighted.
Tywin was minimizing the threat to those in power, keep them focused. There is a reason in the same episode he tells Martell they will need them to resist the dragons.
Later in season 4 Tywin adjusted his mistake. In the small council meeting season 4 he said Dany needs to be dealt with and ordered Varys to send his “little birds” into Mereen to deal with Dany
The entire Dance is everyone sitting huddled up at their respective HQs because its safer to rely on power in numbers. As soon as any dragon ventures out alone, they get killed, including Vhegar. Everyone time Kings landing changes hands, its because a large force of ground troops is arriving immenently, some with dragons, some without. Dragons can burn armies, but they behave about as well as a husky
Tywin was witness to the diminution of the dragons before they went extinct, so he probably believes that Dany's dragons are going to stay small like the dragons whose skulls he had seen at the Mad King's court. The trouble is, Dany lets her dragons roam free unlike her ancestors who kept them in pens and stunted their growth.
Pretty sure he knew exactly how devastating dragons are, he just said this to not make a scene. Theres a scene where he's trying to make an alliance with Oberyn Martell given the history of the Dornish being effective against dragons.
Armies with Archers, he certainly meant. And not to forget: the smallfolk of King's Landing killed the dragons in the dragonpit. Aegon II's Dragon wasn't much use in the end, asides eating Rhaenyra. She had lost before.
I think about this line all the time because it’s so dumb. It’s so dumb, in fact, that I feel like it’s just a projection of strength from Tywin. He figures that IF dragons are back, then there’s either nothing they can do to beat them anyway, or nothing that they’ll come up with at the small council. So he just opts to shut Tyrion up with that line. Because the Lannister army does have those giant crossbow machines, so he clearly made an effort behind the scenes in consideration of dragons.
Aegon wasn't even in a war, it was a conquest, he and his sister-wives literally steamrolled any who didn't submit (save for dorne, but he and visenya definitely gave them hell)
It's important to remember that the last time anyone had done anything with regard to dragons, it was Aegon V getting incinerated at Summerhall, a politician typically remembered as a good king. You really expect Tywin to take something so seriously he hasn't actually seen with his own two eyes? You really expect a child and her fool brother to have three nukes ready to drop on King's Landing?
At the same time, the Triarchy won the war against the dragons, as did the Dorne. Dragons are strong, but vulnerable to countermeasures. So even if you have a dragon, you still need an army at least comparable in size to the enemy.
While it is true that dragons were present for wars up until the end of the Dance with Dragons, I think Tywin is speaking from a more personal pov since he hasn't laid eyes on Dany's dragons at all. Mereen is thousands of miles away from KL, and the only thing Tywin has to go off of their lethality are stories and the skulls that were once kept in the throne room. He doesn't understand nor care about what conditions a dragon needs to grow large enough to turn into a terrible weapon of war. So, he's just choosing to believe that they aren't a threat and can be dealt with using knowledge they have about dragons now.
He was just convincing others not to worry about the dragons. Not until he had a chance to win all the seven kingdoms back to one cause, under his leadership of course. Then, he could devise plots and schemes against the dragons, and send the other six kingdoms off to fight them.
Tywins ego and pride were monstrously strong. The second he was given any kind of command he has spent his entire life obsessively making House Lannister the most powerful and feared House in the entire realm. But what's worse is that he has to display it! He decorates every armour, every horse, every carriage, everything the public sees in vast disgusting amounts of gold. He wasted untold amounts of wealth constructing keeps and towers at Casterly Rock, for no other reason than that every other High House had one and he didn't. The might of Casterly Rock lies under the earth, that is their strength, they are near impregnable like the Eyrie in that way, the keeps and towers he had built did nothing but look nice. And god forbid any embarrassment or weakness any member of his family showed in public (hence Tyrion). Tywin ruled by fear and cruelty, not by wisdom (many a conflict was unecessary) and not by strength (Robb Stark defeated him in every open battle), he was blind to anything that did not fit his small world view and hated what he couldn't control. So, when reports arise of Krakens in the Narrow Sea, or Dragons sighted in Qarth, or ANYTHING happening north of the Wall, Tywin acts the fool and does not listen.
There's also that point in the same season where he talks about how much he dislikes the display of ostentation at the wedding between Joffrey and Margaery. That is WAY out of character for book Tywin, where display of wealth is a display of power.
The Dornish successfully ducked defeat and submission for a generation but they were the only ones to ever prolong defeat and inclusion in the 7 kingdoms
Yes I believe it was a blind spot of his. Any thinking person well versed in Westerosi history would know that Danerys’ dragons were an existential threat.
That scene felt really weird and out of place by how calm everyone was, at the fact Daenerys could have confirmed Dragons. Could no one feel the danger in the room.
Before the appearance of the wights, the world of Westeros was free of magic and magic creatures like dragons, wights and others. There must have been a change that reintroduced magic again, in the book there are some hints, that where not presented in the show.
It wasn't out of character tho. He was suggesting that he didn't believe the mythos that Dany had any dragons, and was suggesting that they haven't existed in 300 years, and he therefore didn't believe they existed now. He just didn't say all of that.
It was more of a denial on his part. Tywin is the type of guy who would hate being powerless and thats exactly what he would be against dragons. The arrival of dragons would ruin everything he worked on his entire life
They won multiple wars after the conquest including multiple dornish wars during Jaehaerys timr and the War of tje Stepstones, which happend over 100 years after the Conquest. Tywin is severly off timeline wise.
Yeah, come to think of it that line did bother me. I never thought to file it mentally as bad writing, which it is; just as a weird, abrading moment that distracted me before I forgot about it a second later. The rest of that scene is pretty captivating, mostly because of Charles Dance's performance.
It is into his character, he says wars are not won by magic ot raw power but from logic and strategy which is only aplicable with armies and other recources like that - you can move, decide, win or lose ppl, depending on your strategy and he was the best strategist. Dragons are uncontrollable beasts and with them only doom is sure,nothing else.
The reason for this statement is to justify Tywin not doing more about Daenerys. In the books he didn’t even know about her dragons when he died. It was a mistake to change that in the show
The dance was very much not decided by dragons. As a matter of fact it could be argued that the dance was ended by the common folk after they killed 4 dragons on their own.
The dragons coming probably were a distant issue to him that had no real priority over all the current problems, if he even believed the dragons to be real and big enough to cause problems. Given that he made prep work to get Dorne back into the fold to fight the dragons should they be a real threat after all however, it could also be that he merely acted like he did not consider the dragons a problem in front of Joff, as to not make the erratic little creep order something really stupid out of fear.
I was always viewed this as Tywin purely coping. He doesn’t want to think about the idea of them even facing 3 dragons in a war because he knows they will be destroyed so he just says “armies win them all the time”
This is where I wish Tywin lived long enough to witness a White Walker and Dragons. The way I love the settings of GoT (which the author and writers ruined_, was the fact that magic and monsters are rare but influential. A character can go through his whole life, or generations, without ever seeing these otherwordly beigns.
Tywin is a pragmatist. Deals with tangible things that he is aware of and knows exist. In his world and most recent history, dragons do not. His assumption that her dragons would be small was wishful thinking. It doesn't make him any less dangerous as an adversary and sometimes adversaries do make mistakes.
I think Twyin is one of those types who have to see it to believe it, in his mind Dany's dragons he assume was as small and harmless as the last dragon kept under the pit, i think he'd realize how much of a threat they were if he had been there to witness Drogon in battle.
I think he knew that dragons win wars, just trying to convince the others something else
Oh he absolutely would have.
He knew that if dragons were actually back like they were during the conquest, then resisting would be hopeless. Tywin isn’t the type to be hopeless, so he convinced himself that the dragons were tiny and insignificant.
I think Tywin wasn't the prorblem, the script writers were
Gods, I wish Tywin would have lived until The Others, giants, and dragons were seen in King's Landing or Casterly Rock - - if only to see his reaction.
Tywin just doesn't have the time to give credit to magical beasts that are supposed to be dead. I'm sure at their existence was still normal he would probably throw all of his children at any unmarried dragon rider😄
Thats just so true
Yep I fully agree and I think part of him wasn't wanting to accept the truth cause he knew he'd be absolutely screwed, there wouldn't be anything that could save him. His army couldn't save him, a marriage couldn't save him, and bending the knee wouldn't save him (obviously because he helped overthrow the mad king, regardless of how and he was, his kids and grandkids didn't deserve to be hunted like dogs along with everyone else related to him and we know he had a hand in it) Dany wouldn't have accepted anything from him except his surrender to which she'd still kill him
@@MagikarpDiete thank you
@@afibuffygirlThat would be a pretty Hard pill to swallow that that the family you thought you dealt with forever was now being led by a thirteen year old girl who brought back magical flying monsters that could destroy your life's work😄
Don't think he was much of a history buff. We saw that in his conversations with Arya, when he had forgotten about Dark Sister and Vaghar.
The Dornish were the only people to successfully resist against dragons. That’s why they kept the title prince. Because they married into the seven kingdoms and weren’t conquered.
Yup, FAAFO mentality, Grit and a ton of Ballistas will always make Targ’s think twice.
@@dillonpereira4195 There words are literally “Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken “ . Also they killed one of Aegon’s dragons and one of his wives.
They also killed daeron I. Under a peace banner no less
@@EtiennejinThe thing is, before the peace was accepted by the conquerors, Dorne almost ceased to exist, every castle and fortress was Burned in there. Doran Martell later says even to this day Dorne is still recovering from the war 300 years ago
In reality, there were factions other than the dornish who resisted dragons. People forget that the Triarchy held their own and sacked spicetown against an army with *many* dragons.
The dumbest thing he did was constantly ostracising Tyrion imo. If he could see past the dwarfism and what happens to his wife they would have won the game of thrones
100%
I am a little hesitant to agree to this. Especially because Tyrion's sharp mind and intellect are a direct result of Tywin's dislike of him.
@@RealCodreX I mean yeah but they are established now. Post Jaime losing his sword hand Tyrion was easily his best ally.
Someone said it in another RUclips GOT thread. Tyrion is loyal, smart, cunning, and dying for his praise.
Unfortunately I believe he has hate for Tyrion he can never let go of. But it’s amazing his love for his late wife is enough for him to keep Tyrion alive .
I think that's why the theory that Tyrion is the Mad King's son exists.
This is completely unrelated to the vid lol. Just venting
I don’t think he really believed the dragons weren’t a threat. I think he was just trying to keep everyone from freaking out about it.
Exactly. The amount of people who miss this point is depressing.
Exactly. This on top of the fact they were fighting another war... the ultimate win game 1 before thinking about game 2
Would you care about poison in your soup when you have a knife at your throat? I think it was that kind of situation.
He had to focus first on the enemies right in front of him.
He didn't even attempt to find out if the rumours about dragons were true (which wouldn't cost him anything), let alone take any precautions. He certainly did not believe dragons could exist.
He was incapable of accepting the world as anything other than what he imagines it to be in his own mind. Tyrion being someone's bastard and the murderer of his wife, his children never having an affair with each other, etc.
If he believed the sun rose from the west, no evidence would be able to convince him otherwise. Just textbook psycopath behavior.
It was the best excuse he could throw. Because dragons. What else is to say?
"The dance was decided by dragons "🤨
No ,it was decided by house Tully , a sheperd and a angry mob în KL
The people, the smallfolks🙏🫶
Yeah but he's still right tho. What tywin said there was dumb. It's like saying nuclear doesn't win war because it's never been used for 80 years.
Don't forget house frey and house blackwood!
That is because both sides had dragons
Nah, Sunfyre got that W, but a snake, flea and gimp gave it away.
I think him mistreating Tyrion was the dumbest thing he did. He didn't have to like Tyrion but abusing him like that finished him and his house. I hope Joanna gave him a good lecture in the afterlife
It is dumb and it was his downfall. For a man who was so obsessed with furthering his family's position, the son he badly wanted, who would have furthered his house incredibly well, was the son he didn't want.
Nice comment but wrong video
People today have trouble understanding cultural nuances from just 10 years ago. Can you imagine what it must be like if someone told you magical dragons live 300 years ago without much hard evidence.
I mean
They have their skulls and the last few centuries of Westerosi history and that of its major houses were basically decided by dragons
It's as believable as the Roman Empire or the Cambrian period
I mean…the dead dragon skulls are irrefutable proof 😂
Joffrey was like the only one who saw that dany and her dragons was a potential threat
The one thing he and Robert had in common
To be fair at this point in the story all they have in Westeros are rumors about Dragons far to the east, obv we as the viewers/readers know that they are real but I feel like most reasonable people in Westeros would dismiss Dany's dragons as just being a fake sailor's tale
@@adrianshantz5740this is what I'm saying. Hearing a wild rumor about something that as far as you know has been gone for well over a century sounds less like some kind of miracle for your enemy and more like an attempt at scaring you with propaganda. Of course he was wrong but can you blame him for not thinking Magic was real?
@@badjuju2721 The show also does a terrible job at conveying how far Mereen is from Westeros. Mereen is thousands of nautical miles away, it would take you around 3 months to sail from Mereen to Westeros, weather permitting, and at least another month extra to sail there from Qarth where the dragons were hatched. So even like Varys, who has little birds immediately reporting on everything Dany does, is always behind by a few months on his info. In the books even these sailor's tales about dragons don't start to reach Westeros until ADWD after Tywin is already dead
Imagine Robert living to hear about the dragons...@@kaijoy4940
Actually it was super consistent with his character. During a conversation with Arya at Harrenhall, he couldn't even name Aegon the Conqueror's sisters. Which shows an irony that a man obsessed with lineage and legacy doesn't know a lot of history.
I think that is more that he doesn't think the wives of Aegon, bore much consideration and plays into how he perceives women and their role in the seven kingdoms. He hates Tyrion, but favours Tyrion being hand, over his Daughter, who he (rightly in her case) believes incapable of good rule.
That’s not true lol 😂🤦🏾♂️ he’s trying to make lannisters history when he was talking to Arya he was picking her brain that’s why he asked follow up questions about her parents
This and I think, after Aerys' ballyhooing of the BLOOD OF THE DRAGON REEE for as long as Tywin was Hand of the King, probably drove Tywin to be practically ignorant of Targaryen legend
I think you've missed the point entirely. Tywin wasn't saying that the dragons were no threat, he's making the point that Dany was rallying more and more troops to her cause because her dragons. In the sacking of Mereen or Yunkai the dragons had minimal involvement. The idea of dragons was much powerful to people, than the actual dragons themselves, Tywin knows that if he can beat Dany, it has to be by keeping more and more people loyal to the crown, and causing dissent in her ranks.
Tywins clever actions here caused Dany to dismiss her strongest and loyalest protector at the time, if you remember.
The Dornish were never conquered. The words of House Martell are "Unbowed, unbent, unbroken."
It's like he forgot dragons existed less than 300 years before
The worst thing tywin did was not killed tyrion when he was born
This is just a case of Tywin’s ignorance of Dragons. He’s never lived through a Dragon onslaught, so he wouldn’t have any experience in dealing with or properly judging them.
Had he been around for Daenerys’ Dragon’s Growth and her eventual traveling to Westeros, Twyin would have changed his tune and tried to bargain with Daenerys.
He wouldn't have been able to do shit with bargaining with dany .He sealed any hope of negotiations with a potential targaryen resurgence when he ordered rhaegar's wife and kids to be murdered like dogs . It would be quite the understatement of how screwed him and his house would be if he knew the truth ,all the work that he has ever done is just bound to be undone by a 13 year old girl at that
I think it also put into perspective that people during this specific period just could not comprehend the power and destruction a dragon brings to the table since they’ve only ever been nothing more but stories of the past in their lifetime. It could also be Tywin in such deep denial of the fact that no matter how smart or strategic in battle you are an atom bomb will still always win.
It's like saying nukes don't win wars because they were only used in WW2 twice and never since lmao
He probably believed they were stunted and small like the ones whose skulls were the size of an apple that aerys had closest to the iron throne.
I think it was dumb in the show where he talks about the threat of Dragons, when in the books they're convinced its just a rumor.
It’s also strange because in the same season he has a conversation with Oberyn where he does seem to take the threat of dragons seriously
It’s not out of character! It’s what he needed to say to stop his allies from switching sides
He literally used the dragons to bring Oberyn Martell (and dorne) back in the fold by offering him a seat in the small counsel, because Dorne was the only Kingdom that resisted Aegons conquest.
(R.I.P. Meraxes)
Even Joffrey knew Daenerys and her dragons were a threat and Tywin still dismissed it. The only thing he was worried about was that Ser Jorah was working for Daenerys so he arranged to get him kicked out. After that he assumed Dany's army would collapse
His dumbest thing was refusing to see how useful Tyrion was.
Dragons also used in the Stepstones
Antagonizing the man with a loaded crossbow pointed at you was pretty dumb, too...
People also need to remember that dragons also got smaller, and smaller, and smaller over time. They have a discussion about the skulls considering it. Tywin definitely underestimated them, but given the information he had, he was working on logic. Dragons hadn’t won a war in such a long time because the ones that existed right up until the end were especially small and would never pose a threat. I’m sure his attitude would’ve adjusted knowing how big they got.
I wish we could have seen his reaction to seeing the dragons. Even just seeing the damage that Drogon did to Jamie’s army would have blew his mind lol.
I think what he meant was that dragons haven't been around for 300 years. Armies have been around before and after (all the time) dragons have died out.
Dragons have not been around for about 150 years. Not 300
@@wanyekivincent2883Dragons were destroyed by a angry mob în King's Landing
@@wanyekivincent2883 dance of the dragons happened 300 years before the game of thrones when Tywin said that
aegons conquest was 300 years before GOT, and HoTD was 150 years before. Look up the actual lore
@@gdmalouf9178 I thought that was 600 years. 300 years before the dance which was 300 years before the rebellion
It's like saying "atomic bombs haven't won a war in 80 years"
More like saying they haven't won a war in 180 years, because Tywin is timeline wise severly off with the last dragon dying about 150 years before this.
Maegor crushed everything with or without Balerion , and I believe that he was the greatest of Targaryans
He may have technically got facts incorrect but his main point was right
I like to believe he was just downplaying the threat in front of the council but backstage he's still trying to get additional intel to assess the threat and constantly receiving uodates.
I merely wrote that line off as just another D&D classic. Their original dialogue seemed a bit more juvenile than that of G.R.R.M's books
Dragons can destroy armies, but they cannot hold castles. That is what armies are for.
He was counting on dorne. Or trying to copy what dorne did. Scorpion bolts all along the walls. That’s what probably going through his head.
sees Drogon in battle
"Mace, bring me my quill and paper"
Tywin undermines the power that comes with dragons. Look where they got Dany! Even WITHOUT them she was still magical and powerful but WITH them she got her Unsullied Army, she conquered Mereen, Yunkai and many other things she did. She freed people and they CHOSE to follow her. The dragons are capable of burning ARMIES and even DESTROYING Kings landing. One dragon alone did this now imagine 3? He thinks too highly of himself here and that was HIS mistake and he passed that onto Cercei and Jamie who underestimated HER. She burned Jamie’s troops and then ended Cercei and Jamie with ONE dragon. Let that sink in. Read that again.
I would have seriously loved to see all 3 dragons at the end. It would have been so powerful. Even when there were 2 and they were burning the undead it was epic. Cersei got into her mind that one dragon wasn’t as much of a threat as 3. Clearly we saw she was very mistaken 😂
The later day dragons were all tiny, and useless in war. I think that reputation remains a bit, where people know what dragons were, but likely that these three new dragons are gonna be more like the smaller, quite useless ones
When he said joffery will fight at the black water that's the line that makes me laugh all the time lol
You're missing the point of Tywin's statement. He's doing what he always does: projecting the image of power, confidence, and control. He needs to appear powerful to be powerful, that's the whole point of his style of leadership: rule through fear, I'm the strongest house, don't cross me or else, etc. Deep down, he's plenty smart enough to know he's f'd the second Danny lands in Westeros with her dragons, but he needs to downplay the threat to the Small Council (and Joff) to make it seem like he has everything well in hand, reality of the situation be damned.
I mean... man, what was he supposed to say?
"Whelp guys, prepare your turn table speechs, she's got 3 dragons we better just give up"
Lol you do make a good point there
I feel Tywin was just trying to keep everyone in line, kind of saying “don’t worry about that, stay loyal to me”
Title is clickbait. I Tywins perspective, dragons do not exist anymore. He is one or the most powerful human individual in Westeros and has achieved everything through strategy, military and first and foremost gold. This statement is anything but stupid.
Tywin is one of my favourite characters but he does suffer from lack of judgement from time to time; Him considering an alliance with the wildlings against the North and plotting to make that incompetent lickspittle Slynt the Lord Commander of the Night's Watch is another one that has always struck me as strangely short-sighted.
It always seemed crazy to me that he didn't know Aria was his cup maid.
Tywin was minimizing the threat to those in power, keep them focused. There is a reason in the same episode he tells Martell they will need them to resist the dragons.
Later in season 4 Tywin adjusted his mistake. In the small council meeting season 4 he said Dany needs to be dealt with and ordered Varys to send his “little birds” into Mereen to deal with Dany
Well he remembers how long it takes for dragons to grow and how small the last ones were
Imagine if Tywin lived long enough to see Dany's dragons at Casterly Rock
When he said that I was like “ummmm cause they’ve all been DEAD!”
The entire Dance is everyone sitting huddled up at their respective HQs because its safer to rely on power in numbers. As soon as any dragon ventures out alone, they get killed, including Vhegar. Everyone time Kings landing changes hands, its because a large force of ground troops is arriving immenently, some with dragons, some without. Dragons can burn armies, but they behave about as well as a husky
Tywin was witness to the diminution of the dragons before they went extinct, so he probably believes that Dany's dragons are going to stay small like the dragons whose skulls he had seen at the Mad King's court. The trouble is, Dany lets her dragons roam free unlike her ancestors who kept them in pens and stunted their growth.
I think the point is that no matter what, infantry are the only thing that can take and hold terrain like cities and thus win a war
Pretty sure he knew exactly how devastating dragons are, he just said this to not make a scene. Theres a scene where he's trying to make an alliance with Oberyn Martell given the history of the Dornish being effective against dragons.
That's totally true. Armies won war, dragons are like air force, they are just advantages
Armies with Archers, he certainly meant.
And not to forget: the smallfolk of King's Landing killed the dragons in the dragonpit. Aegon II's Dragon wasn't much use in the end, asides eating Rhaenyra. She had lost before.
I think about this line all the time because it’s so dumb. It’s so dumb, in fact, that I feel like it’s just a projection of strength from Tywin. He figures that IF dragons are back, then there’s either nothing they can do to beat them anyway, or nothing that they’ll come up with at the small council. So he just opts to shut Tyrion up with that line. Because the Lannister army does have those giant crossbow machines, so he clearly made an effort behind the scenes in consideration of dragons.
Tywin didn’t live long enough to fight a dragon and it’s funny that the son he favored got his butt handed to him by a dragon.
Tywin is capable of tackling all those beasts with his army😏
"Dreams didn’t make us Kings, Dragons did"
Aegon wasn't even in a war, it was a conquest, he and his sister-wives literally steamrolled any who didn't submit (save for dorne, but he and visenya definitely gave them hell)
Dragons were forgotten by most at this point. Just like the white walkers they were reduced to a myth, folklore of the past.
It's important to remember that the last time anyone had done anything with regard to dragons, it was Aegon V getting incinerated at Summerhall, a politician typically remembered as a good king. You really expect Tywin to take something so seriously he hasn't actually seen with his own two eyes? You really expect a child and her fool brother to have three nukes ready to drop on King's Landing?
At the same time, the Triarchy won the war against the dragons, as did the Dorne. Dragons are strong, but vulnerable to countermeasures. So even if you have a dragon, you still need an army at least comparable in size to the enemy.
While it is true that dragons were present for wars up until the end of the Dance with Dragons, I think Tywin is speaking from a more personal pov since he hasn't laid eyes on Dany's dragons at all. Mereen is thousands of miles away from KL, and the only thing Tywin has to go off of their lethality are stories and the skulls that were once kept in the throne room. He doesn't understand nor care about what conditions a dragon needs to grow large enough to turn into a terrible weapon of war. So, he's just choosing to believe that they aren't a threat and can be dealt with using knowledge they have about dragons now.
He literally went on to say exactly 2 seconds later “she must be dealt with”
And then in the scene after he makes a deal with Oberyn to prepare against dragons
Tywin was skeptical because he knew that after the dance of the dragons the dragons were much smaller and sickly until they died out completely.
He was just convincing others not to worry about the dragons. Not until he had a chance to win all the seven kingdoms back to one cause, under his leadership of course. Then, he could devise plots and schemes against the dragons, and send the other six kingdoms off to fight them.
Its about not letting other people loose motivation ,purpose and workethic
what do you expect he's goin to say? We all gonna die??? He is projecting power and raise morale of his allies.
Tywins ego and pride were monstrously strong. The second he was given any kind of command he has spent his entire life obsessively making House Lannister the most powerful and feared House in the entire realm. But what's worse is that he has to display it! He decorates every armour, every horse, every carriage, everything the public sees in vast disgusting amounts of gold. He wasted untold amounts of wealth constructing keeps and towers at Casterly Rock, for no other reason than that every other High House had one and he didn't. The might of Casterly Rock lies under the earth, that is their strength, they are near impregnable like the Eyrie in that way, the keeps and towers he had built did nothing but look nice. And god forbid any embarrassment or weakness any member of his family showed in public (hence Tyrion). Tywin ruled by fear and cruelty, not by wisdom (many a conflict was unecessary) and not by strength (Robb Stark defeated him in every open battle), he was blind to anything that did not fit his small world view and hated what he couldn't control. So, when reports arise of Krakens in the Narrow Sea, or Dragons sighted in Qarth, or ANYTHING happening north of the Wall, Tywin acts the fool and does not listen.
There has to be some ground between these near invincible army destroying dragons and the one that got wrecked by a wooden boat.
Especially strange after his remark to Arya when they both were in Harrenhal that Aegon “changed the rules” of war.
lol that happened in the show not the books dear. This series is called Video BOOKS, not Video SHOW
There's also that point in the same season where he talks about how much he dislikes the display of ostentation at the wedding between Joffrey and Margaery. That is WAY out of character for book Tywin, where display of wealth is a display of power.
Seems more like the dance of the dragon was decided by turncloaks, paranoia, and then mobs that slayed dragons in the pit.
I did always think it was short-sighted of him.
The Dornish successfully ducked defeat and submission for a generation but they were the only ones to ever prolong defeat and inclusion in the 7 kingdoms
Yes I believe it was a blind spot of his. Any thinking person well versed in Westerosi history would know that Danerys’ dragons were an existential threat.
That scene felt really weird and out of place by how calm everyone was, at the fact Daenerys could have confirmed Dragons. Could no one feel the danger in the room.
He was trying to act like he wasn’t worried.
You don’t send men to kill a dragon for you after telling them it’s most likely impossible.
Before the appearance of the wights, the world of Westeros was free of magic and magic creatures like dragons, wights and others.
There must have been a change that reintroduced magic again, in the book there are some hints, that where not presented in the show.
People sometimes say things to manipulate others even if it means ignoring the facts you already know
It wasn't out of character tho. He was suggesting that he didn't believe the mythos that Dany had any dragons, and was suggesting that they haven't existed in 300 years, and he therefore didn't believe they existed now.
He just didn't say all of that.
It was more of a denial on his part. Tywin is the type of guy who would hate being powerless and thats exactly what he would be against dragons. The arrival of dragons would ruin everything he worked on his entire life
Dragons might have not won any major wars, but they sure as hell kept the empire together for 300 years
They won multiple wars after the conquest including multiple dornish wars during Jaehaerys timr and the War of tje Stepstones, which happend over 100 years after the Conquest. Tywin is severly off timeline wise.
I always thought this was a bluff to keep others from seeing the Dragons as the threat they truly were and defecting to Daenerys.
Yeah, come to think of it that line did bother me. I never thought to file it mentally as bad writing, which it is; just as a weird, abrading moment that distracted me before I forgot about it a second later. The rest of that scene is pretty captivating, mostly because of Charles Dance's performance.
Cause Tywin isn’t the super genius that Charles Dance portrays him as.
It is into his character, he says wars are not won by magic ot raw power but from logic and strategy which is only aplicable with armies and other recources like that - you can move, decide, win or lose ppl, depending on your strategy and he was the best strategist. Dragons are uncontrollable beasts and with them only doom is sure,nothing else.
But then, two of the three dragons fell just because of a single arrow or spear. That was really stupid.
The reason for this statement is to justify Tywin not doing more about Daenerys. In the books he didn’t even know about her dragons when he died. It was a mistake to change that in the show
I feel like it illustrates his point beautifully
The dance was very much not decided by dragons. As a matter of fact it could be argued that the dance was ended by the common folk after they killed 4 dragons on their own.
And his last dumbest decision was making his younger son his enemy and making Cersie his ally 😂😂😂😂
The dragons coming probably were a distant issue to him that had no real priority over all the current problems, if he even believed the dragons to be real and big enough to cause problems. Given that he made prep work to get Dorne back into the fold to fight the dragons should they be a real threat after all however, it could also be that he merely acted like he did not consider the dragons a problem in front of Joff, as to not make the erratic little creep order something really stupid out of fear.
I never understood why he kept dismissing Dany as a threat.
He is cocky.
I was always viewed this as Tywin purely coping. He doesn’t want to think about the idea of them even facing 3 dragons in a war because he knows they will be destroyed so he just says “armies win them all the time”
This is where I wish Tywin lived long enough to witness a White Walker and Dragons. The way I love the settings of GoT (which the author and writers ruined_, was the fact that magic and monsters are rare but influential. A character can go through his whole life, or generations, without ever seeing these otherwordly beigns.
Tywin is a pragmatist. Deals with tangible things that he is aware of and knows exist. In his world and most recent history, dragons do not. His assumption that her dragons would be small was wishful thinking. It doesn't make him any less dangerous as an adversary and sometimes adversaries do make mistakes.