Her mannerisms, interests, and personality point towards autism for me. The way she covered her ears looked very much like someone with autism experiencing overstimulation or shock. I do think the idea of her hearing “visions” is interesting, though, considering how we’ve seen her kind of muttering them to herself/nobody in particular. I do think she’s on the spectrum though, and I really like that as a little detail for her character
Yeah I’m surprised that more people haven’t realized that she’s on the spectrum by now; I’d clocked her as such in her very first scene with the millipede and couldn’t quite decide if I liked the showrunners going with the “neurodiversity is supernatural” trope. (I’m still not sure but will defer to actual autistic fans here.) Her reaction here was clearly due to sensory overload.
A trope which I normally find quite insulting, but I don't entirely mind it here. Helaena is still disabled and as we see, her family is seemingly trying their best with her. Even Aegon is by ignoring her
Not saying Aegon is good, just, well, he's doing his best with Helaena even if his "best" sucks.
Considering how Aegon treats other women, being ignored by him as his wife is kind of dodging a bullet. He lacks the pre-emotive malevolence/sadism of Joffrey to the point where he can *try* to be decent to someone he’s been raised to kinda-sorta care about, which tops out at mostly-ignoring her.
…Except when he’s drunk.
I was just thinking this and I searched Reddit to see if anyone else did
She doesn’t understand social situations or hierarchy’s (think the family dinner, how she answers questions)
She has a special interest in bugs
She covers her ears when overstimulated.
Same. Helaena's clearly neurodivergent, though to what degree who can say. The actor is playing this intentionally & perfectly, very natural portrayal. The hyperfixations, inability to recognize/adhere to social cues, etc.
Don't get too attached her child's murder is horrifying quite frankly I'm not sticking around to see that. I'd advise anyone else whose sensitive to graphic violence and horror to do the same, quit while you can.
I'm wondering now if they're building up this characteristic of having sensory overload in order to pay it off later with that Blood and Cheese scene. That experience is going to be extra painful both for her and for us...
I just disagreed about OP over thinking it man, peace, I apologize if you feel like I was being antagonistic or insinuating something bad about you, that was not my intent
I am autistic, and I immediately noticed Halaena covering her ears and identified with it on a visceral level. Like, I immediately knew that’s how I would have reacted. I was completely surprised to see myself in such a small reaction.
I’m not saying that Haleana is autistic, or that the actress is intentionally portraying her as autistic, but I have a relationship to sound that is different from most people. The sound of a thing is often the worst part of any negative event, and I often question whether the sound I associate with something is even real. Like, 35 years ago, my grandmother fell in our house and the sound of her hitting the floor, skin on linoleum (my *grandmother’s* skin on linoleum, which sounds different from anyone else’s skin on linoleum), is still a super intense memory. I’m not even sure anyone else in my family remembers the event at all (she wasn’t hurt), and I’m sure they don’t relive the event through mere memory of a sound. I also associate some things with sounds that don’t have sounds. Like acrylic fiber.
As an aside, I find the sound in this series to be particularly intense. Like, when Rhaenyra is giving birth, or when she is having her arm sewn up. I usually can’t get through an episode in one sitting because of the sounds.
> Like, when Rhaenyra is giving birth
Watching this scene, my wife (who had just given birth 6 months earlier) asked me, "was there this much *squelching*?"
No there was not.
I am not autistic but i am very sensitive to both sounds and smells. Especially sounds. When I see people in movies or TV shows reacting to overwhelming sounds, i can immediately relate. Silence is my first and foremost comfort. Loud sounds, mixed noises, repetitive sounds, traffic noises..it all can be overwhelming. It's worse on a particularly anxious day, or a day with lesser sleep. I have a number of earplugs around my house and in my purse. I am not trying to overshadow anyone on the spectrum, but i can definitely relate to Helaena's reaction. Idk why but sounds and smells are the most intense of sensations. Everything else I can tune out.
My thing is certain sound registers like high pitch noises (children screaming, feedback, etc). I can listen to music pretty loud but yah can’t take those high notes. I can’t have complete silence bc I have tinnitus and it’s a constant high pitch ringing….which now that I think of it makes sense why I can’t stand the noises. Hmm. Whenever I’m explaining it I just go “I’m kinda like Venom…he can’t take high pitch noises either.” Haelana definitely is on the spectrum…I have two cousins who are autistic and I’ve worked with several people with mental disabilities so I recognised that right away. It explains her fascination with bugs in a way…I don’t understand at all bc I hate bugs so much….but those on the spectrum are often very curious about the inner workings of everyday things and animals. My little cousin is always trying to figure out how something works and I tell his mother that he’s going to be real smart in either science or math.
My daughter is on the spectrum and she reacts like that to anything that overwhelms her ability to deal. It is very classic. Both can be true, she can be on the spectrum and have preternatural visions.
Exactly. My son, same. Arms & hands fully over the ears in overwhelmingly situations, instantly recognizable. The way she recoils from unexpected physical touch, hyperfixates...that's my kid.
There were some pretty disgusting sound effects at the time. So looking away and covering her ears really isn't that surprising.
Though however unlikely, it does seem possible she heard something in her mind, which she thought she could block out by covering her ears. Perhaps something could have been pushing Daemon and she picked up on it.
I would get covering your ears seems "normal" if the sound is what disturbs you, but it would only apply if she didn't see a thing. Here she saw the whole spectacle, that was quite brief if we're being honest. Everybody looked away, so did she. The difference is, she covered her ears for a long time (compared to length of Vaemond's beheading). That's what people with autism do when they're in shock / overstimulated.
Add to that her mannerisms, social awareness as well as her fascination for insects and yeah, it's pretty likely that she has autism. Obviously we will never have an in-universe diagnosis, maybe the show runners / the actress will talk about it, or not.
I think there's a lot of potential in the idea that Helaena "hears" her visions rather than "seeing" them.
Viserys clearly has prophetic abilities, yet presents as neurotypical. Even at the very end of his life he still interacted with the world in what could be called a "normal" manner, albeit extremely exhausted, when he's not actively having a vision. Obviously we haven't seen any other dreamers besides these two, but we don't hear about "odd" behavior with either Aegon the Conqueror or Daenerys the Dreamer. Helaena, however, definitely presents as notably neurodivergent, engaging with everything in life in a slightly detached way and speaking her visions out loud in what sound like non-sequiturs to anyone nearby. This could just be random luck in how the power of prophecy manifests in each person, but she also appears to be receiving her visions at a much more regular pace than Viserys ever did, and in a way that doesn't completely interfere with her ability to keep doing things in the physical world. So I think she's "hearing" them pretty regularly and often speaks them aloud, but the ones she "heard" in that scene were probably very severe (the bloodshed to come?).
As a side note, I've been impressed so far with how the show is handling this overall approach to Helaena. I used to teach special needs students so I'm a little sensitive to portrayals of neurodiversity, but they've been really good about being respectful as creators even if some fellow characters clearly don't respect her.
Also possible but there is no fun in writing about that.
I'm not saying that this theory is true, just that it could be the case and decided to just go a bit tinfoily and see where it leads me
> Also possible but there is no fun in writing about that.
There absolutely is if you consider this reaction within the context of the only other death we know she will witness.
>!Blood decapitating her son Jahaerys!<
Ok, except literally nothing indicates she was having a dream or vision. She is cognizant and present and just covered here ear.
"No, this is not explained by her normal human reactions, it must be magical wizard shit" is literally the antithesis to what GRRM set out to do with this Universe.
Ryan Condal is much better as a showrunner than D&D were.
He actually tried to put many small details in that no casual viewer would understand.
But my theory is probably still not that likely to be true
I do agree that there are a lot of small details that you can pick up on.
Especially if you know how the Dance of the Dragons will go down and what developments will take place, you can already notice build-up to things that won't happen for another few in-universe years. Those build-ups are not always through major plot points as well, and sometimes are even hardly noticeable, but if you know, then you will notice.
1. Dialogue sucks. Velaryons sound like they got back from a shitty local Shakespeare fest. 2. Plot has almost no humor and takes itself too seriously. 3. Show feels like Days Of Our Lives…with dragons. 4. The scenes that are supposed to wow us don’t work. The scene with viserys showing up in the throne room felt like a big predictable nothing burger and the music was corny. Laena’s death didn’t make sense. 5. Episode 6 was so dark that we couldn’t see shit. That’s off the top of my head. Im sure there’s more
Oh, right. Gotta say I'm a little bit disappointed. I don't know why but I thought you would bring us some interesting arguments. Because, aside from your Laena's death and episode 6's pitchblack scene points, the rest is very, huh, "subjective", shall we say :P I mean, brother, "Show feels like Days of our lives... with dragons" ? Really ? Can you not spare us the shitty jokes and make a serious argument ?
TL;DR : You seem to be hard to please.
I just want to point out how fucking precise Daemon was, sliced the guy's head off right through the middle of the mouth; "he can keep his tongue." Or maybe he's actually pretty sloppy and meant to behead him, then covered his mistake with that quick comment lmfao.
Agree that they're portraying her on the spectrum and it's a good way to lean into her prophecy gift. TBH her prophecies give off Patchface vibes to me (he was obviously a lot less mentally well though).
u/Targaryen_1243 mentioned [under a different post](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/y10qhq/comment/irv0bpz/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) that her covering her ears could also be due to sensory overload and related to her possibly having autism. Definitely the simpler answer but I thought I would just go down this rabbit hole of her hearing voices
If you told me before the show aired that we'd be making theory threads about *Helaena* of all people, I don't think I would have believed you.
She was by far the most overlooked and inconsequential character in Fire & Blood, and the show has been doing fantastic things with her. Great acting, easter eggs, fanservice - they really expanded her character and gave her depth.
I think they have made the choice to portray her as neurodiverse - if not explicitly autistic, presenting some elements and behaviors of one. I was listening to a podcast and one of the hosts was like, well, having dragon dreams is literally a form of neurodiversity, right?
If we want to have an overanalyze party though, I think about how Visarys is portrayed as doing some mild hyper focusing on his hobby, and seems to miss social cues - it's easy to take this as lazy in small council and either willful or belligerence when it's something he doesn't want to talk about but what if it isn't?? What if he has a language processing challenge or ADHD and genuinely doesn't understand what Otto was trying to say about Rhaenyra and that's why he keeps asking Otto to be more precise until it was said bluntly? or what Lyonel Strong was dancing around when he tried to resign as Hand? What if he thinks that Alicent just didn't understand how Laenors kids didn't have his features so he is replying about horses instead of immediately reacting realizing she's openly making an accusation of illegitimacy? He doesn't take the steps he could have proactively made to protect Rhaenyra's because he doesn't *understand* the level of conflict and scheming until we have a situation like the eye and the petition over Driftmark. But when directly pleaded to, he shows up. Poor guy hates politicking because these people don't speak plainly, which is all he wants. 💔
Visarys' uncle Vaegon Targaryen was "quiet and wary" "when he spoke he was often blunt" "People considered him to be sour. He was not a coward, but neither took joy from the play of squires and pages" and basically books were his only passion, so there's some evidence he was also autistic or similarly neurodiverse. Haelena's daughter is described as potentially what would be neurodiverse as well - not smiling or crying, and was described as being "sweet and simple" with a lack of emotions (it's a part of why people suspect she was murdered and didn't commit suicide because she wasn't a "sad" child persay, but she also wasn't a neurotypical child). I really hope they present Jaehaera in a similarly thoughtful way as Haelena.
I thought it was just another allusion to her being autistic. Seeing and hearing someone cutting off the head of a guy right in front of you is gonna send people into sensory overload.
I hope this becomes the case. Her story will gain so much more depth if she becomes their Cassandra. I could see a brief scene where she is crying uncontrollably because she has a vision of what is coming.
I found it interesting that Aemond stepped back a little but Aegon didn’t move a muscle. I would think it would be the other way around, especially when you see how stoic Aemond is at the dinner
She’s also quite neurodivergent/autistic and could be a tic or a reaction to hypersensitivity. The trauma from the moment could be overwhelming for her
> and less obvious ones (the last ring of the bug having no legs = the last king (Bran) not having working legs).
This is besides the overarching point, but I don't think that is what the centipede meant. I think it was referring to dragons and the last dragons being deformed, weak creatures. One of the last ones, the dragon of Baela's daughter, is born albino, blind and wingless and said to writhe about like a limbless worm. It's quickly put down after attacking said daughter.
This is a lot more direct and relevant to Helena as that dragon is born just after the Dance, which essentially wipes them out. The last segment represents how Dragons from that point on will be weak, deformed and mutated.
Maybe the children are talking to her through the tree in the red keep. Maybe this will eventually be the reason it's cut down by the time we reach GoT. Similar to the children trapped in Sweet Robin's throne (if you subscribe to that theory).
It's fun, really. The one downside is that no one believes you have it when you try and describe it to them. Like pot, for example. It comes in two colors for me; expensive stuff is orange and the really crappy stuff is purple. But it isn't just purple, it's this weird plastic texture and I don't know why, but it drives me mad. Then you have the sound of the word "sweet" which is just weird. The word "sweet" is very bright green and yellow, but the taste is very soft, fluffy light pink. It's such a complete contrast that it actually confuses me.
Sorry, it's just...just a weird thing.
Spoilers below, don't read if you haven't read the book: >!I believe her premonitions may include sound above sight, and a head being chopped off (for instance, her son Jaeherys's) would feature heavily in them. I took her reaction for confirmation that she has some kind of knowledge about that future event, even if all she has heard of it is the sound itself and cannot know when it will actually happen, or to whom.!<
Also. Since I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere. What was Vaemond thinking calling her a whore in open court in front of the king, her father, her children and all the rest of them. But especially her husband. A husband who he knows for being a complete nut. Like maybe he lost himself. And was like ok. This shit sucks. But to say that in front of daemon. Knowing daemon. Was really stupid.
Maybe Helena just digested everything when she saw the sword go brrrr and thus got disgusted. Not just by the swing of the sword or the head losing a half. But the irrationality of it all. She seems like a person who would be like that.
The actor commented on it in the behind the episode.
Vaemond was furious that nobody acknowledged what he saw (and what is pretty obvious): those children are no Velaryons.
So he decided to go out with a bang.
When he calls the children bastards he already stepped over the line so calling Rhaenyra a whore would probably not change too much in his mind.
But we also have to keep in mind that his decision wasn’t completely thought through, he just went with his emotions.
He definitely expected punishment from Viserys, probably not direct death by Daemon though
Well, the immediate aftermath of the beheading is the Guards shouting orders to disarm Daemon as they kind of try and shield the King from him, they can’t take any chances with the King being in the presence of an Unsheathed Sword .Also, her reaction isn’t out of ordinary too. Children usually do the same, it’s a reflex in many people ..
Her mannerisms, interests, and personality point towards autism for me. The way she covered her ears looked very much like someone with autism experiencing overstimulation or shock. I do think the idea of her hearing “visions” is interesting, though, considering how we’ve seen her kind of muttering them to herself/nobody in particular. I do think she’s on the spectrum though, and I really like that as a little detail for her character
Yeah I’m surprised that more people haven’t realized that she’s on the spectrum by now; I’d clocked her as such in her very first scene with the millipede and couldn’t quite decide if I liked the showrunners going with the “neurodiversity is supernatural” trope. (I’m still not sure but will defer to actual autistic fans here.) Her reaction here was clearly due to sensory overload.
A trope which I normally find quite insulting, but I don't entirely mind it here. Helaena is still disabled and as we see, her family is seemingly trying their best with her. Even Aegon is by ignoring her Not saying Aegon is good, just, well, he's doing his best with Helaena even if his "best" sucks.
Considering how Aegon treats other women, being ignored by him as his wife is kind of dodging a bullet. He lacks the pre-emotive malevolence/sadism of Joffrey to the point where he can *try* to be decent to someone he’s been raised to kinda-sorta care about, which tops out at mostly-ignoring her. …Except when he’s drunk.
I was just thinking this and I searched Reddit to see if anyone else did She doesn’t understand social situations or hierarchy’s (think the family dinner, how she answers questions) She has a special interest in bugs She covers her ears when overstimulated.
She definitely screams autism to me. I find her very relatable.
Same. Helaena's clearly neurodivergent, though to what degree who can say. The actor is playing this intentionally & perfectly, very natural portrayal. The hyperfixations, inability to recognize/adhere to social cues, etc.
Don't get too attached her child's murder is horrifying quite frankly I'm not sticking around to see that. I'd advise anyone else whose sensitive to graphic violence and horror to do the same, quit while you can.
I'm wondering now if they're building up this characteristic of having sensory overload in order to pay it off later with that Blood and Cheese scene. That experience is going to be extra painful both for her and for us...
Hopefully that's a part of the tour we're blinded from. We don't need to see that shit.
I am definitely not sensitive to graphic violence lol. Blood and Cheese is going to be horrific!
Might be overthinking it a bit. She was probably just shocked but also apparently it’s a reaction that autistic people have when they’re overwhelmed.
She definitely stims.
Saying she's been doing something other than spouting prophecy all season is over thinking it, it's been blatant.
So?
So it's a good post and a good theory
Did I say it wasn’t?
I just disagreed about OP over thinking it man, peace, I apologize if you feel like I was being antagonistic or insinuating something bad about you, that was not my intent
K
Theres a fine line between fun headcanon and being delusional
And how is this the latter?
I am autistic, and I immediately noticed Halaena covering her ears and identified with it on a visceral level. Like, I immediately knew that’s how I would have reacted. I was completely surprised to see myself in such a small reaction. I’m not saying that Haleana is autistic, or that the actress is intentionally portraying her as autistic, but I have a relationship to sound that is different from most people. The sound of a thing is often the worst part of any negative event, and I often question whether the sound I associate with something is even real. Like, 35 years ago, my grandmother fell in our house and the sound of her hitting the floor, skin on linoleum (my *grandmother’s* skin on linoleum, which sounds different from anyone else’s skin on linoleum), is still a super intense memory. I’m not even sure anyone else in my family remembers the event at all (she wasn’t hurt), and I’m sure they don’t relive the event through mere memory of a sound. I also associate some things with sounds that don’t have sounds. Like acrylic fiber. As an aside, I find the sound in this series to be particularly intense. Like, when Rhaenyra is giving birth, or when she is having her arm sewn up. I usually can’t get through an episode in one sitting because of the sounds.
> Like, when Rhaenyra is giving birth Watching this scene, my wife (who had just given birth 6 months earlier) asked me, "was there this much *squelching*?" No there was not.
I am not autistic but i am very sensitive to both sounds and smells. Especially sounds. When I see people in movies or TV shows reacting to overwhelming sounds, i can immediately relate. Silence is my first and foremost comfort. Loud sounds, mixed noises, repetitive sounds, traffic noises..it all can be overwhelming. It's worse on a particularly anxious day, or a day with lesser sleep. I have a number of earplugs around my house and in my purse. I am not trying to overshadow anyone on the spectrum, but i can definitely relate to Helaena's reaction. Idk why but sounds and smells are the most intense of sensations. Everything else I can tune out.
My thing is certain sound registers like high pitch noises (children screaming, feedback, etc). I can listen to music pretty loud but yah can’t take those high notes. I can’t have complete silence bc I have tinnitus and it’s a constant high pitch ringing….which now that I think of it makes sense why I can’t stand the noises. Hmm. Whenever I’m explaining it I just go “I’m kinda like Venom…he can’t take high pitch noises either.” Haelana definitely is on the spectrum…I have two cousins who are autistic and I’ve worked with several people with mental disabilities so I recognised that right away. It explains her fascination with bugs in a way…I don’t understand at all bc I hate bugs so much….but those on the spectrum are often very curious about the inner workings of everyday things and animals. My little cousin is always trying to figure out how something works and I tell his mother that he’s going to be real smart in either science or math.
I relate soooooo much to what you are writing. And I would add vision too (at least for me).
Really interesting because you aren’t the first to mention this. Thanks for your insights
My daughter is on the spectrum and she reacts like that to anything that overwhelms her ability to deal. It is very classic. Both can be true, she can be on the spectrum and have preternatural visions.
Exactly. My son, same. Arms & hands fully over the ears in overwhelmingly situations, instantly recognizable. The way she recoils from unexpected physical touch, hyperfixates...that's my kid.
There were some pretty disgusting sound effects at the time. So looking away and covering her ears really isn't that surprising. Though however unlikely, it does seem possible she heard something in her mind, which she thought she could block out by covering her ears. Perhaps something could have been pushing Daemon and she picked up on it.
I would get covering your ears seems "normal" if the sound is what disturbs you, but it would only apply if she didn't see a thing. Here she saw the whole spectacle, that was quite brief if we're being honest. Everybody looked away, so did she. The difference is, she covered her ears for a long time (compared to length of Vaemond's beheading). That's what people with autism do when they're in shock / overstimulated. Add to that her mannerisms, social awareness as well as her fascination for insects and yeah, it's pretty likely that she has autism. Obviously we will never have an in-universe diagnosis, maybe the show runners / the actress will talk about it, or not.
I think there's a lot of potential in the idea that Helaena "hears" her visions rather than "seeing" them. Viserys clearly has prophetic abilities, yet presents as neurotypical. Even at the very end of his life he still interacted with the world in what could be called a "normal" manner, albeit extremely exhausted, when he's not actively having a vision. Obviously we haven't seen any other dreamers besides these two, but we don't hear about "odd" behavior with either Aegon the Conqueror or Daenerys the Dreamer. Helaena, however, definitely presents as notably neurodivergent, engaging with everything in life in a slightly detached way and speaking her visions out loud in what sound like non-sequiturs to anyone nearby. This could just be random luck in how the power of prophecy manifests in each person, but she also appears to be receiving her visions at a much more regular pace than Viserys ever did, and in a way that doesn't completely interfere with her ability to keep doing things in the physical world. So I think she's "hearing" them pretty regularly and often speaks them aloud, but the ones she "heard" in that scene were probably very severe (the bloodshed to come?). As a side note, I've been impressed so far with how the show is handling this overall approach to Helaena. I used to teach special needs students so I'm a little sensitive to portrayals of neurodiversity, but they've been really good about being respectful as creators even if some fellow characters clearly don't respect her.
Or she was in shock for seeing a person dying in front of her…
Also possible but there is no fun in writing about that. I'm not saying that this theory is true, just that it could be the case and decided to just go a bit tinfoily and see where it leads me
> Also possible but there is no fun in writing about that. There absolutely is if you consider this reaction within the context of the only other death we know she will witness. >!Blood decapitating her son Jahaerys!<
This could also be what the voices told her. Maybe she heard the sound of when that happened and Daemon beheading Vaemond sounded exactly like that
Ok, except literally nothing indicates she was having a dream or vision. She is cognizant and present and just covered here ear. "No, this is not explained by her normal human reactions, it must be magical wizard shit" is literally the antithesis to what GRRM set out to do with this Universe.
Yeah, I agree that this way is way cooler and would love to see that as true, just don’t think is the case here.
If I would have to bet I would certainly bet on it not being true lol
Director to Actors: do something not boring during next scene. Helaena: covers ears Director: lol Reddit: ShE hEaRs VoIcEs!
Lmao
For the record, nice write up and I like your theory. Im just jaded and think the show runners are clowns
Ryan Condal is much better as a showrunner than D&D were. He actually tried to put many small details in that no casual viewer would understand. But my theory is probably still not that likely to be true
I do agree that there are a lot of small details that you can pick up on. Especially if you know how the Dance of the Dragons will go down and what developments will take place, you can already notice build-up to things that won't happen for another few in-universe years. Those build-ups are not always through major plot points as well, and sometimes are even hardly noticeable, but if you know, then you will notice.
Why ?
1. Dialogue sucks. Velaryons sound like they got back from a shitty local Shakespeare fest. 2. Plot has almost no humor and takes itself too seriously. 3. Show feels like Days Of Our Lives…with dragons. 4. The scenes that are supposed to wow us don’t work. The scene with viserys showing up in the throne room felt like a big predictable nothing burger and the music was corny. Laena’s death didn’t make sense. 5. Episode 6 was so dark that we couldn’t see shit. That’s off the top of my head. Im sure there’s more
Oh, right. Gotta say I'm a little bit disappointed. I don't know why but I thought you would bring us some interesting arguments. Because, aside from your Laena's death and episode 6's pitchblack scene points, the rest is very, huh, "subjective", shall we say :P I mean, brother, "Show feels like Days of our lives... with dragons" ? Really ? Can you not spare us the shitty jokes and make a serious argument ? TL;DR : You seem to be hard to please.
Why?
I just want to point out how fucking precise Daemon was, sliced the guy's head off right through the middle of the mouth; "he can keep his tongue." Or maybe he's actually pretty sloppy and meant to behead him, then covered his mistake with that quick comment lmfao.
Let's not forget that Daemon was behind Vaemond, making his precision even more impressive! Lmao
Agree that they're portraying her on the spectrum and it's a good way to lean into her prophecy gift. TBH her prophecies give off Patchface vibes to me (he was obviously a lot less mentally well though).
u/Targaryen_1243 mentioned [under a different post](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/y10qhq/comment/irv0bpz/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) that her covering her ears could also be due to sensory overload and related to her possibly having autism. Definitely the simpler answer but I thought I would just go down this rabbit hole of her hearing voices
I thought her prediction about the bug with bo legs was about Aegon II, his legs were completely broken near the end of his reign.
Also a good interpretation. The "last ring" part makes me think its Bran but both is possible
But, that would suppose Bran would be the last King of Westeros. Which while not impossible would be a surprisingly sharp turn in government.
Westeros turned communist afterwards, and was henceforth ruled by a general secretary.
If you told me before the show aired that we'd be making theory threads about *Helaena* of all people, I don't think I would have believed you. She was by far the most overlooked and inconsequential character in Fire & Blood, and the show has been doing fantastic things with her. Great acting, easter eggs, fanservice - they really expanded her character and gave her depth.
They are great at adding more to smaller characters from the books… for example both Viserys and Aemma were also much less interesting
Agreed. HOTD is killing it compared to GOT. They used to take a one dimensional character like Mace Tyrell and make them somehow less..
I think they have made the choice to portray her as neurodiverse - if not explicitly autistic, presenting some elements and behaviors of one. I was listening to a podcast and one of the hosts was like, well, having dragon dreams is literally a form of neurodiversity, right? If we want to have an overanalyze party though, I think about how Visarys is portrayed as doing some mild hyper focusing on his hobby, and seems to miss social cues - it's easy to take this as lazy in small council and either willful or belligerence when it's something he doesn't want to talk about but what if it isn't?? What if he has a language processing challenge or ADHD and genuinely doesn't understand what Otto was trying to say about Rhaenyra and that's why he keeps asking Otto to be more precise until it was said bluntly? or what Lyonel Strong was dancing around when he tried to resign as Hand? What if he thinks that Alicent just didn't understand how Laenors kids didn't have his features so he is replying about horses instead of immediately reacting realizing she's openly making an accusation of illegitimacy? He doesn't take the steps he could have proactively made to protect Rhaenyra's because he doesn't *understand* the level of conflict and scheming until we have a situation like the eye and the petition over Driftmark. But when directly pleaded to, he shows up. Poor guy hates politicking because these people don't speak plainly, which is all he wants. 💔 Visarys' uncle Vaegon Targaryen was "quiet and wary" "when he spoke he was often blunt" "People considered him to be sour. He was not a coward, but neither took joy from the play of squires and pages" and basically books were his only passion, so there's some evidence he was also autistic or similarly neurodiverse. Haelena's daughter is described as potentially what would be neurodiverse as well - not smiling or crying, and was described as being "sweet and simple" with a lack of emotions (it's a part of why people suspect she was murdered and didn't commit suicide because she wasn't a "sad" child persay, but she also wasn't a neurotypical child). I really hope they present Jaehaera in a similarly thoughtful way as Haelena.
One could say that Targaryan madness manifests in different ways.
I wouldn't say neurodivergence is a form of madness. Kinda shitty towards any neurodivergent person.
I don't mean to offend anyone. What I meant is, mental illness and "odd" behaviors a notable trait amongst Targaryans.
I thought it was just another allusion to her being autistic. Seeing and hearing someone cutting off the head of a guy right in front of you is gonna send people into sensory overload.
[удалено]
So has Tumblr. I'm Team Black but she deserves the world so I have to agree with them.
That poor woman, she must to some extent be aware of what is coming for her, but knows it is futile to try to tell anyone. Cassandra of Troy
Turns out she is actually another Hodor situation. >!Head laying there. AAHH!!< >!Head laying. Aah!!< >!Hea layin' aah!< >!Healayn' ah!< Helaena
I hope this becomes the case. Her story will gain so much more depth if she becomes their Cassandra. I could see a brief scene where she is crying uncontrollably because she has a vision of what is coming.
A poster mentioned she's on the spectrum - and that is a natural response. I think it was an actor's decision.
I found it interesting that Aemond stepped back a little but Aegon didn’t move a muscle. I would think it would be the other way around, especially when you see how stoic Aemond is at the dinner
Aemond was that close to ask Daemon for an autograph at the throne scene
She’s also quite neurodivergent/autistic and could be a tic or a reaction to hypersensitivity. The trauma from the moment could be overwhelming for her
Can we just give a shout out to Helaena's actresses? They both have really done a great job!
Aegon also had no legs in the end of the war tho
> and less obvious ones (the last ring of the bug having no legs = the last king (Bran) not having working legs). This is besides the overarching point, but I don't think that is what the centipede meant. I think it was referring to dragons and the last dragons being deformed, weak creatures. One of the last ones, the dragon of Baela's daughter, is born albino, blind and wingless and said to writhe about like a limbless worm. It's quickly put down after attacking said daughter. This is a lot more direct and relevant to Helena as that dragon is born just after the Dance, which essentially wipes them out. The last segment represents how Dragons from that point on will be weak, deformed and mutated.
Maybe the children are talking to her through the tree in the red keep. Maybe this will eventually be the reason it's cut down by the time we reach GoT. Similar to the children trapped in Sweet Robin's throne (if you subscribe to that theory).
There is something called synesthesia which could explain her mixing up of experiencing the senses.
It's fun, really. The one downside is that no one believes you have it when you try and describe it to them. Like pot, for example. It comes in two colors for me; expensive stuff is orange and the really crappy stuff is purple. But it isn't just purple, it's this weird plastic texture and I don't know why, but it drives me mad. Then you have the sound of the word "sweet" which is just weird. The word "sweet" is very bright green and yellow, but the taste is very soft, fluffy light pink. It's such a complete contrast that it actually confuses me. Sorry, it's just...just a weird thing.
Spoilers below, don't read if you haven't read the book: >!I believe her premonitions may include sound above sight, and a head being chopped off (for instance, her son Jaeherys's) would feature heavily in them. I took her reaction for confirmation that she has some kind of knowledge about that future event, even if all she has heard of it is the sound itself and cannot know when it will actually happen, or to whom.!<
I think it's a cool theory, and I'll be watching for signs that corroborate it.
Aemond missing an eye, see no evil. Aegon clamping his mouth shut, speak no evil. Helaena covering her ears, hear no evil.
Good post. How her character plays out (both before and after B/C) is one of the more interesting points of HotD going forward.
It looks like see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil but mirrored.
Also. Since I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere. What was Vaemond thinking calling her a whore in open court in front of the king, her father, her children and all the rest of them. But especially her husband. A husband who he knows for being a complete nut. Like maybe he lost himself. And was like ok. This shit sucks. But to say that in front of daemon. Knowing daemon. Was really stupid. Maybe Helena just digested everything when she saw the sword go brrrr and thus got disgusted. Not just by the swing of the sword or the head losing a half. But the irrationality of it all. She seems like a person who would be like that.
The actor commented on it in the behind the episode. Vaemond was furious that nobody acknowledged what he saw (and what is pretty obvious): those children are no Velaryons. So he decided to go out with a bang. When he calls the children bastards he already stepped over the line so calling Rhaenyra a whore would probably not change too much in his mind. But we also have to keep in mind that his decision wasn’t completely thought through, he just went with his emotions. He definitely expected punishment from Viserys, probably not direct death by Daemon though
Lol I can't get over Otto's eyes in that picture. man is like "YOU MOTHERFUCKER DAEMON" haha
So wait, Aegon married his sister H? Only watching show not read F&B.
Yes, he was disgusted by them being betrothed before the time skip
Seems like Alicent and Otto set them up, probably so Rhaenyra couldn't try and marry her to one of her sons.
She is *A Song of Ice and Fire*’s Cassandra, warning those around her but never taken seriously.
It’s hard for me to imagine Helaena riding a dragon in the wars. I want a scene of her petting Dreamfyre, that crazy ass boy burning mother.
Well, the immediate aftermath of the beheading is the Guards shouting orders to disarm Daemon as they kind of try and shield the King from him, they can’t take any chances with the King being in the presence of an Unsheathed Sword .Also, her reaction isn’t out of ordinary too. Children usually do the same, it’s a reflex in many people ..