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Message: <blockquote data-quote="WizarDru" data-source="post: 1302847" data-attributes="member: 151">I think it was more the phrasing that got me, than anything else. As for the two instances you mention, I think they make perfect sense, both in the context of the characters and the story.  I've known many people who behave differently in front of their parents, particularly if their father was a powerful, domineering man who you feared....which is the case for both Tyrion and Theon. In Tyrion's case, let's remember that his father can cow Kings, let alone Tyrion.  Tywin was not impressed with Tyrion's mental faculties, and had little use for him.  At the heart of it, all Tyrion wanted to do was get his father's approval...to get a measure of the respect his brother Jamie receives.  But he never could, never did and never would have.  Because Tywin was an absolute bastard. In Theon's case, two different things contribute.  Theon was a fool, and the code of the Iron Men.  The Greyjoys barely even considered Theon one of them, as likely a turncoat as anything else.  He doesn't behave like a Greyjoy, really, and is almost a foreigner in some respects.  He's cocky, arrogant and inexperienced in the ways that matter most to them.  Further, the Iron Men are driven by competence.  He who is the smartest, most powerful and most charismatic will lead.  Take a look at how the next leader is chosen in the excerpt published in Dragon magazine a few months back.  Next, Theon is a constant reminder of a failure the Greyjoys would just as soon forget, and they resent him personally for it.  Is that fair?  No.  But it's very believable, especially given their beliefs.  Theon pointing that out would have counterproductive to what he was trying to accomplish.  Now that he'd returned, Theon thought he could sweep in as the new heir to the throne.  Given that one of his uncles had taken the priesthood, another had no designs on ruling the third had been exiled and his only sibling was a woman, Theon thought he was a shoe-in.  Therefore it did little good to anger his father by pointing out his failure to conquer Westeros. And again, Theon is pretty intimidated by his father.  He just clams up in his presence, as all of the issues between them come up.  Not the least of which is that his father, like Tyrion's, has little use for him and thinks him an abject failure.  In fact, Theon's father thinks less of him than Tywin does of Tyrion.  Tyrion is an embarassment to Tywin and a reminder of his dead wife, while Theon is just useless in his father's eyes.  Even Tywin uses Tyrion as a tool....Theon's father doesn't even have that much use for him.</blockquote>

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