Game of Thrones theory suggests Varys poisoned Daenerys to turn her into the Mad Queen

Warning: This article contains spoilers for Game of Thrones season 8.

A Game of Thrones theory is attempting to explain how Daenerys Targaryen turned into the “Mad Queen” in the final episodes of the series.

The twist was one of the show’s most controversial moments and sent the Dany fandom into meltdown, but one fan has worked out a way to make sense of it.

Reddit user J_Mrad explained how Varys may have poisoned Daenerys in a last-ditch attempt to stop her becoming queen.

They began by reminding people of an early scene in the penultimate episode of the series.

In the scene, Varys is speaking to a young girl who is spying on Daenerys and appears to be helping him in a plot to poison her.

The user suggested that while Varys was sentenced to death soon after the scene, his spy may have still carried out the plan to poison Daenerys.

They wrote:

Straight up poisoning the queen would be a terrible idea. He knows how much Jon loves her and, though it would mean he will have to take the throne, it wouldn't end nicely for him after Jon figures out what he did. A better plan would be to push Dany into madness early, letting it loose on King's Landing and showing everyone a Mad Queen, which is exactly what happened. How? Basilisk's blood.

Basilisk’s blood is a poison mentioned by Oberyn Martell in the A Song of Ice and Fire books which "produces violent madness".

However, it doesn’t feature in the TV series.

The user argued that the poison would help justify Daenerys’ sudden change and give Varys’ story a better ending.

This would justify the sudden descent into madness she took in such a short time. It would also give Varys a more meaningful arc.

A fan on Twitter also pointed out that the scene could have been a call-back to season 1.

But some fans couldn’t get behind the theory.

Although one user was satisfied with it.

To be honest, it's an interesting idea but explaining Daenerys’ character arc with a small reference from the books would be an extremely unsatisfying end to her story.

Nevertheless, although Game of Thrones has abruptly dropped plot points before, it is weird that Varys’ scene didn’t come to anything when it appeared so late in the series.

Did it mean anything? Or was it just another red herring?

Like so many things with Game of Thrones, we may never know the true answer.

HT: Someecards

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