Olenna Tyrell Didn't Kill Joffrey Baratheon At The Purple Wedding: A Song Of Ice And Fire Theory 

The issue with this is that George RR Martin has already come out and said that Olenna Tyrell did indeed murder Joffrey at the wedding using the bead of poison from Sansa's hairnet. He gave an interview with Rolling Stone around the time that Purple Wedding episode aired, and because this was years after the book came out, he was asked about the book and show comparison, and he reaffirmed that in the books Olenna Tyrell killed Joffrey and framed Sansa to spare Margaery the pain of being Joffrey's queen when would he eventually turned on her, because she assumed he would turn on Margaery the same way he turned on Sansa.

Another plus for confessing to Sansa: Littlefinger tells a child that he had her abuser killed. I could see that having an endearing effect upon Sansa.

I can't remember where, but I heard a theory once that Littlefinger was actually trying to kill Tyrian, since he wanted Sansa to be a widow. According to this theory, the poison was actually in the pigeon pie that a server had given Tyrian. Joffery drank from the chalice with no ill effects (opposed to the other guy we see die by the strangler who went suddenly) but started 'choking' when he took a bite of Tyrian's pie. In my opinion, that makes more sense than Olenna and Littlefinger playing hot potato with poison. LIttlefinger purposefully alienating Sansa from any other potential support than him is a really good point!

" I dreamt of a maid at a feast with purple serpents in her hair, venom dripping from their fangs. And later I dreamt that maid again, slaying a savage giant in a castle built of snow." ---- The poison was in the hairnet.

The fact that olenna tyrell would poison joffrey so publicly is kind of advantageous to her in some ways. It makes it seem like why would she or her family poison him if they were clearly about to happily marry margaery and joffrey? And it happening around so many other people provides a large list of other possible suspects.

I am still convinced Tywin was involved in some way. There was already a lot of tension between him and Joffrey right before the wedding, and right after his death he does not seem shocked and never looks for the actual killer. At Joffrey's funeral he doesn't show any compassion and is discussing ruling with Tommen immediately. He also knows Tyrion is innocent but pursues him anyway. Sure he hates Tyrion but he is not blinded by hate like Cersei, he immediately will let Tyrion join the nights watch if Jamie takes his place at casterly rock. I believe he either knows who did it and let it happen, or was actively involved.

While I do think it would’ve been more advantageous to have Joffrey die at a later date, I think the Tyrells decided to murder Joffrey as soon as Sansa told them what kind of person he really was. Petyr already warned them about Joffrey , Sansa confirmed it. I think Joffrey’s murder was a group effort between Petyr and Olenna because they had a common goal. And even if they were under suspicion (1) The Tyrells were too valuable to the Lannisters. They had no other major allies. Accusing the Tyrells of murder with little to know proof would be dumb, and (2) how would the Lannisters prove it? we know why the Tyrells wanted Joffrey dead, but what motive could the Lannisters give? Publicly admit that Joffrey was a monster? And I’m not arguing that it was a perfect plan, because there were many ways it could’ve gone wrong, but their reason for wanting Joffrey dead wasn’t logical or political. It was their personal love for Margaery driving the plot. I still believe it was the Tyrells. It was good enough for a half baked plot and they got away with it.

The Purple Wedding is one of the most baffling incidents in the books. I'm inclined to believe Preston Jacobs' take on the wedding, that is to say Baelish was attempting to assassinate Tyrion via the wedding pie, but Joffrey's unintentional intervention saved Tyrion at the cost of Joff's own life. The Tyrell's involvement is possible, but as described by Baelish, it would have been a convoluted mess of a plan. As told by Baelish, the poison went from Olenna to Baelish to Dontos to Sansa, just for Olenna to take the poison back from Sansa at the feast. Why involve all these seemingly extraneous players if she was going to do the poisoning herself? Something just isn't adding up. My best guess is that Sansa and Dontos were backup patsies everything could be blamed on if the poisoning didn't go off as intended.

I just realized that olenna could literally have worn some piece of her own jewelery with the gem, or just slipped it into a pocket or sleeve.

Ok, but it wasn't HOUSE TYRELL that plotted to get Joffrey out of the way to advance their political position. It was OLENA TYRELL, who did it to protect her granddaughter. There is no way that Mace had anything to do with it. He is far too risk averse and is not known to be particularly ruthless. Remember, we know almost nothing about Margeary's personality in the books. We don't know if she is really the shrewd seductress that is depicted on the show, or if she is just an unwitting pawn being moved around the board by her father. She could be every bit as naive and meek as Sansa for all we know. So, we are not given the impression in the books that she would be able to keep herself safe from Joffrey by manipulating him the way she does in the show. Mace might very well be willing to put his daughter at the mercy of a monster for the rest of her life in order to advance the political power of House Tyrell, but Olena is most likely more sompathetic, having once been married off as a political poker chip herself. So, I think that Olena is perfectly willing to burn the world down-including House Tyrell-in order to protect the people she loves the most. As to House Tyrell looking possibly guilty, Cersei's hatred and paranoia toward Tyrion was not a secret within the Red Keep. Someone like Littlefinger, who spends most of his time at the Red Keep, would be keenly aware of that. So, it could be reasonably predicted that Cersei would suspect Tyrion first. It would also have been reasonable to suspect that Joffrey would have found some excuse during the wedding to publicly humiliate Tyrion, since that is what he did at Tyrion's own wedding...especially if they were aware of the dwarf jousting show beforehand, which Littlefinger almost certainly was. As to not needing Littlefinger because there were so many Tyrell men around, remember, MACE TYRELL had nothing to do with this. Olena Tyrell is only the Dowager Lady of Highgarden. She has very little official authority over anyone. She would have had far fewer resources to draw upon than Mace. As to the supposed foolishness of hinging the plot on the fashion sense of a teenage girl, there is no reason to think that Olena did not have a backup "Amethyst" hidden up her sleeve just in case Sansa decided not to wear the hairnet. It made perfect sense to implicate Sansa in this way, because it would indirectly implicate Tyrion. And it made sense for Dontos to give Sansa the hairnet, so that if Sansa was caught and questioned, Littlefinger would only have to kill Dontos to cover his tracks.

Olenna and Littlefinger counted on the Lannister being too dumb and too hateful of Tyrion to ever look at another possibility for the assassination, and they were right. At the point of the wedding, no one would ever suspect perfect little Margaery. Tyrion and Sansa, on the other hand, had been humiliated by Joffrey for quite some time, and were easy targets. It also posed a chance for Littlefinger to get his hands on Sansa, while under the guise of a friend trying to save her.

A thought that lingers In my mind about the Tyrells surrounding the king as he died is the idea of hiding, not in plain sight, but in the spotlight. In Babylon 5, the character Londo is poisoned at his birthday party. He receives the gift and asks who it is from. One of his wife's says it is from her. He opens it and out shoots two projectiles that poison Londo. By drawing all the attention to her and being upset, when questioned on where she got the gift, they believe her and hound a man who had nothing to do with Londo. He sold things he found, and it happens to have found a doll that responds to the touch of people who are of centari origins. Another instance of hiding in the spotlight or at least bright lights is Garak from deep space 9. He is very expressive and shows specific things at specific times. He also changes the truth all the time of how he can do what he does. By surrounding Joffery, it is almost too obvious for the Tyrells to kill the king, all the way to the point that it eliminates them from the pool of suspects. I also agree that little finger telling Sansa that she is right is what he would have always done. If she said she does think Tyrion or the Dorns killed the king, I'm sure little finger would have said, "yes your right". All in the effort to make Sansa think that he is her only true ally. Great video

If they did try to place the blame on Sansa it would’ve force her to run to the Tyrells. In her mind they were the only group of people that was kind to her and they got her out of the arrange marriage to Joffrey. The only reason why she was still in KingsLanding is because she is the daughter of the true Warden of the North and that Stark name still had weight in it

Olenna claiming the killing (in the show) makes sense because she gets to hurt Cersei one last time. Didn't mean she did it.

The wedding is not a smart time to do it but Littlefinger did it to avenge Cat, who they killed at a wedding. It works even if he intended to kill Tyrion, thinking he was involved in the red wedding

Overall I agree with everything you said. The theory I like best is the one where when Sansa was in shock after thinking she saw her father's sword a waiter took the poison from her hair and put it in the cream on top of the Tyrion's pie. Which Joffery ate a bite of just before he started coughing. Killing Tyrion would have been a lot more useful to Littlefinger as part of his plan is to get Sansa married to someone of his choosing, which he can't do because she is already married. Granted that would make Sansa look very guilty since she runs away right afterward, but her looking guilty was likely always part of the plan for some reason.

The thing is, all the great points you made about Peter wanting to isolate Sansa from everyone else so he was the only one she trusted can still be true if Olenna was involved. Not the Tyrells, just Olenna. The sticking point for me is that Olenna touched Sansa’s hairnet at the wedding and that Peter knew later that she had done that. And there is definitely something odd about the stones in the hairnet. They’re not real. So was the fake hairnet and the missing stone and the hair touch all a red herring for Sansa’s benefit? How would he have orchestrated that with Olenna if they weren’t plotting together? This video really has me thinking though, thank you!

Joffery killed Joffery with the life he lived

I think you make a very good argument for why the Purple Wedding was a pretty insane thing for the Tyrells to try to do, and you can chalk that up to it being a place in the narrative where things happened because the plot said so or House Tyrell, despite the front they present, still being made up of fallible people who can make bad decisions and/or who maybe aren't all actually acting in perfect accordance, and since there are no Tyrell POVs there's a lot of ambiguity on all of this. But I'm still taking it as more or less "fact" that Olenna was indeed involved even if no other Tyrell was. It's definitively true that she did it on the show, and while GOT certainly changed and simplified many many things and I by no means take everything that happened on it as determinative for where ASOIAF is going in every respect--GRRM himself wrote "The Lion and the Rose," the Purple Wedding episode itself, and there's freeze frame confirmation proof that one of the jewels on the "necklace" that Dontos had given Sansa was missing after Olenna went up to her and randomly got very handsy during their conversation. And Olenna's pointed dialogue about how terrible it is to kill a man at a wedding exists in both show and books, so you know, obvious irony if Olenna is indeed killing a man at a wedding right this second. I just...see no reason to think that GRRM is making such radically different choices from book to show in his own script here. One last point, while you can certainly argue that the Tyrells could/should have found a better way of getting rid of Joffrey before the wedding and then move to quickly secure a replacement betrothal with Tommen, imo preventing a consummation was not *just* to keep Margaery from having to sleep with a dangerous psychopath even once. If they'd consummated that could be grounds for the Lannisters to possibly reject her for Tommen and/or for their marriage to be shrouded in even more controversy than the fact of Margaery's previous marriage to Renly sticks them with (in history Henry VIII initially argued for an annulment after many years of marriage on the basis that Catherine of Aragon had previously been married to his older brother). And to keep him around long enough for Margaery to get an heir while trusting that he could be kept in check for however long that needed to be was a very dangerous gamble for not only Margaery's but also Loras's sake, especially given book Loras's characterization and his position in the Kingsguard. It's by no means an ironclad explanation for why they (or possibly Olenna acting independently of Mace if he thought this was actually sustainable) would throw in with Littlefinger to do this, but well, again there are no POVs in House Tyrell, so imo it's not that surprising that they'd end up wrangled at least a little bit to serve the plot.

My tinfoil is Tywin. He couldn't control Joffrey, but he could control Tommen. Sansa dying would be a bonus, making the Stark rival, and his ally Roose Bolton, in a stronger position to rule the north. LF's bragging as just a means to freeze Sansa in place, so she could rely on him.

I'm of the opinion that it's actually Tywin Lannister who killed his grandson, because of how loud the whole affair is and also because he hates anything that embarrasses him and Joffrey was one uncontrollable brat, who would risk years of carefully constructed planning to seat his house on the iron throne (yes, he knows all of them are hundred percent Lannisters) and he can put his brother at Highgarden after ousting the Tyrells.

My vote is for Cersei. 1. the poison was in the pie and not the wine. 2. the pie was Tyrion's pie that Joff took. 3. Cersei was trying to kill Tyrion and accidentally killed her own son, and it explains why she was so quick to pin it on Tyrion. 4. It would be thematically good as a sort of everything Cersei tries to prevent her prophecy only leads to her own downfall, and the following decline of her mental state and her trying to reconcile her own actions. "Tyrion's fault Joff's dead because he didn't die like he was supposed to." Or it could be Littlefinger but the target was still Tyrion, cause yes Joff's death would bring chaos but Tyrion's death would have widowed Sansa which is even a major problem for him following this, and the hair net at the trial could have been info Littlefinger fed to Cersei trying to make sure Tyrion died after he missed at wedding.

Sansa was forced to mature early to the evils that people are capable of. Also, Little finger stood to gain her trust by his confession, knowing that she was helpless to Joffery's tyranny. She already had mastered maintaining silence in the wake of others aggression without breaking character.

I think it was Littlefinger with the pigeon pie that was meant for Tyrion.

Great points. Great theory. Well done. I've been skeptical and suspicious about some of that myself. Especially the hairnet/necklace part. *WAY* too many variables to count on going right.

“Olenna just kind of forgot” -DnD

Sometimes the best way to remove yourself from suspicion is to make yourself the most obvious suspect. This isn't normally advisable, but in a special case like this where you have a reputation for being especially crafty, few people would be willing to believe you would do something so blindingly obvious and stupid. It would be so far out of character for you that people would reject the possibility out of hand and look elsewhere.

I think it was just Petyr Baelish. He hated how the aristocracy looked down on him, even though he was technically one of them. He's a very selfish character, so probably convinced himself that he was doing the right thing and then could be a "King maker". He included the Tyrell's in his recounting to Sansa as an insurance policy and ensure there was enough suspicion for every house to be against each other.

Good points, but I totally think Olena and Littlefinger plotted and Olena did it, so here's my take. Olena Tyrell wanted to take Sansa and marry her to her eldest grandson and the Tyrell heir, so that would make the Tyrells even MORE rich and powerful than the Lannisters because Sansa (as far as they know) is the heir to Winterfell. After learning what a little shit Joffery is, she also told her son Mace that Margarey had to marry a king but not necessarily Joffery, so THAT placated Mace and she was free to get rid of Joffery. Tywin got wind of their 'marriage plans' and married Sansa to Tyrion (for the same reason, Winterfell) and THAT pissed Olena off. She knew she had been out-maneuvered and had to move fast, so why not kill Joffery at the wedding? The Tyrell army is very powerful so Tywin wouldn't mess with them, he's already at war. It was widely known how much Tyrion and Joffery didn't get along and that Tyrion had threatened him openly and MOST importantly, how much Cersei hated him, so all suspicion would be on Tyrion, and sadly, Sansa was of no USE to the Tyrells anymore so SHE being THE ONE to actually bring the poison to the wedding and perhaps being suspect was an added BONUS. What Olena didn't know was that Littlefinger already had plans to get Sansa away from the Castle for himself! I think Olena wanted Sansa there wearing the hairnet that would be found out to have a missing stone and be blamed also, but oops, Littlefinger lied to her and whisked Sansa away to the Vale. Remember, Littlefinger has been gone for a while supposedly in the Vale on Tywins orders, so NOBODY is going to suspect him and he can double-cross anybody. What we don't know is when the plan with Littlefinger was made, but HE knew the details and he told Dontos to do that whole 'shinning knight' thing and make Sansa PROMISE she would wear the hairnet. If she didn't then Olena would have to kill Joffery another day, but she was so predictable, and why did Olena do the whole bit with straightening the hair net, etc. if not to grab the jewel and HOW did Littlefinge know exactly how it played out when he wasn't there? He gave Sansa details. He ALSO suggested and provided the Darwf show so he knew it would UPSET Tyrion and make him mad at Joff, everyone would see and so an opportunity would most likely present itself for Olena to drop the poison at the perfect time (that was HER job) and she did and all eyes were on Tyrion and Sansa, only Sansa was gone. Joffery was dead, Tyrion was blamed, and Tywin had lost Winterfell. All plans are dependent on what moves the other people make so you have to be able to change them up at a whim, but this one worked out pretty well for Olena. Now if ONLY GRRM would FINISH so we can see if she gets caught!

One other important thing to note about the littlefinger as the guilty party is that they make a repeated point of remaining silent on the waters when loading Sansa onto his ship because sound travels miles over the open water and they dont want anyone on shore to hear them. This means that sound from shore also travels to the ship just as easily. The point here is that the bells are ringing in a way that indicates the death of the King. Little finger doesn't actually need to have been involved to know that Joffery is dead, he gains that information from the bells alone and Sansa fills in all the details for him, he's effectively cold-reading her the entire time he's talking to her in that initial conversation. He's also vague on details until AFTER arriving at the fingers where he would have been able to receive more specific details to give to Sansa to prove his story to her and implicate her in the death so that she would be bound to him. He doesn't technically have to have been involved. Also, based on how the poison works, it should have been immediate when he drank the wine, instead, it's when he eats the pie that he chokes, leaving open the possibility that either the pie was poisoned, knowing he would take the first piece, OR that he legitimately just choked to death on a piece of pie crust and died naturally. They symptoms of choking and the strangler are intentionally very similar which is what its value is in assassinations, and the arch maester is both corrupt and kinda getting senile. He could either have misidentified the cause of death (or been biased to look for a poison and concluded strangler based on it being missing from his stores and the symptoms) or Tywin could have told him to lie and say it was poison so that he could implicate his son in a maneuver to get him out of lannister line of succession and sent to the wall rather than be killed.

the hairnet seems like a really elaborate plan to create suspicion towards the Tyrells, which undoubtedly worked as Cersei is obsessed with seeing their downfall.

I enjoy the theory that the intended target was Tyrion. Though that wouldn’t cause as much chaos if it was all Petyr’s plan. I think Cersei probably tried to kill Tyrion, and accidentally killed her own son.

I never thought Joffrey was the target, I always thought Tyrion was the most likely actual target and Joffrey got killed by accident, the murderer being Littlefinger, who had plenty of reasons to kill Tyrion, mainly that any plot he has with Sansa has her needing to not be married

Poisons often have antidotes. Margery is the perfect deflection, having already taken the antidote before the meal. They could use the wine and she could drink it and not die, thus throwing them off the scent of the true cause. It appears as if his larynx got swollen shut from the poison, but then he choked on his food. I think the type of poison used is key. They wanted a poison that worked like choking to death on food.

Cersei accidentally killed Joff by having Tyrion’s lemon sauce poisoned on his pie. Which Joff ate. She is also responsible for killing Tomen by driving him to suicide. This theory will be confirmed when she orders Marcella’s body double killed and they mistakenly kill Marcella. The poison in the hairnet seems to be black widow poison and not strangler. Also the hair net is a “web” ... a place for spiders. So this means it went to Tywin -he was the target of this poison as we learn from Tyrion that he looks poisoned at the trial and he is in the shitter with backed up bowels when Tyrion kills him. Having symptoms Of a victim of black widow poison. The up shot of this is that Sansa does not have purple serpents in her hair. And of course the the stones are black amethyst which is causing some confusion. LF and Olena are planning to use the wedding to get close to Tywin but administer a slow poison so they don’t look guilty. Why they involve Sansa makes no sense as you point out.

cool theory, but this part is convincing to the contrary: "The wind has been at your hair, though." The little old woman reached up and fussed at the loose strands, tucking them back into place and straightening Sansa's hair net.

The Tyrell's "sworn enemy" was there too though, the Red Viper, so perhaps not knowing the Tyrion thing was gunna go down, was hoping for Oberyn to be the main suspect of the poisoning. Oberyn who had threatened the Lannisters openly and often. Perhaps. I've not made it through the whole vid yet so maybe that gets mentioned. Just one of my random thoughts on it.

You know, that's what struck me at the time I first read this scene: Why the shell game with the hairnet? If Olenna could conceal the poison until using it *after* taking the fake gem in the hairnet, why couldn't she just walk in with it already hidden on her person? If there was some kind of TSA-style security everyone had to go through before entering Joffrey's presence, then using an unknowing mule to get the poison inside the venue would make sense. That way, if security recognized the fake gem for what it was, it would be someone else who got arrested. But given that the kind of mindset that would lead to security pat downs of the most powerful people in the land doesn't exist in Westeros, then involving Sansa at all makes no sense. I think the intended goal of the whole endeavor was to get rid of Tyrion, the true brains of the Lannister family. Framing him for murder of his nephew should have gotten him executed, and would have if it hadn't been for Jaime's guilt about Tysha. Getting Joffrey dead was just a bonus. Petyr Baelish is a prime suspect, because the incident enabled him to control Sansa better, and he did have the preexisting plan of smuggling her out that night. But a another possible candidate is Tywin Lannister himself. He knew how dangerously unfit to rule Joffrey was, and Joffrey was too close to the age of majority for Tywin to be sure of molding him into being an acceptable king before he lost legal control of Joffrey. Tywin had already been through the experience of serving a mad king with Aerys, and Joffrey was already worse than Aerys had been at the same age. Tywin may have thought the best course of action was to dispose of two family embarrassments, (Joffrey and Tyrion) at one stroke, and start afresh with Tommen after having married Cersei off to remove her detrimental influence on Tommen. Unfortunately, his abuse of Tyrion and Tysha came back to bite him, and he died before he could enact his full plan.

Not the first time that poison killed a king, and just like before we may know conspirators but the act it’s self remains somewhat a mystery. Which is the whole point of poison, and anonymity of it.

In my opinion, the culprit is Littlefinger. However, the target was Tyrion. If there is anyone that Littlefinger wants dead, it's Tyrion. From the Dontos rescue plan, we know that Littlefinger's main goal was to spirit Sansa away. He wants to marry her to himself/someone else, but he can't do it with Tyrion alive. Killing Joffrey doesn't advance his position in any way. It's so true that the reason he gives Sansa (to cause chaos) is the most idiotic and ridiculous reason ever.

super interesting theory. it was a niggling thought at the back of my mind that too many things had to go right for this plan to work. but i have one question: when petyr is telling sansa about who actually poisoned joffrey, he tells her: “I will wager you that at some point during the evening someone told you that your hair net was crooked and straightened it for you.” if the poison wasn't in the hairnet and olenna tyrell was not the one who poisoned joffrey, then how could petyr have known that olenna was gonna arrange sansa's hair net? if the tyrell's didn't poison joffrey then wouldn't there be no need to for olenna to take one of the stones?

I'm sure you go over this later in the video, but Little finger does NOT in-fact admit to conspiring with Olenna. That was Sansa volunteering information and he then picked up on it and "confirmed it"

It’s not that complicated… Little Finger conspired with house Tyrell to murder Joffrey. House Tyrell intended for a Lannister’s to discover the poison in Sansa’s hairnet and blame her, placing the motive for Joffrey‘s murder, as revenge for Joffrey murdering Sansa’s father. Little Finger deviated from the plot with house Tyrell, by arranging for Sansa Stark’s escape while everyone was distracted… this kept Sansa and play so little finger could use her to advantage, while maintaining the appearance of Sansa’s guilt, but also left just enough of a question to give Little Finger leverage against house Tyrell, should they decide to betray him at some point.

In my opinion that the fact that plan was full of loopholes and the whole plan would fail if a tiny component would go wrong makes this so brilliant. In the case anyone was able to figure out, they could say that how ludicrous and illogical the plan sounded like. Thus dismissing suspicion completely.

Joffrey killed himself because he realized that the ensuing succession crisis would harm far more people than he ever could.

There is no question who killed Joffrey on the TV show. 2 people in particular. It will be interesting to see how it plays out in the book.

But here's the thing, the Tyrell's don't really have a motive obvious to the other parties. In the show they have Joffrey whacked because he was a horrible person and they wanted to protect Margaery from having to endure him for a lifetime. For someone like Tywin, who treats his children like pawns and tools, this would be a completely alien mindset. Jamie in the book didn't really care that Joffrey died (as he was never allowed to act like a father to Joffrey) and wasn't even present at the event and Cersei was likely to blame it on Tyrion since Tyrion had frequently disrespected and manhandled Joffrey and had been mocked and humiliated at the wedding. Let's also not forget that Littlefinger is a lot more charismatic in the book and less of an obvious ne'erdowell and he'd jump at the chance of killing Joffrey simply because it would create more chaos and destabilise the realm. Chaos is a ladder and all that. And saying that the Tyrells would be prime suspects because they were present...it would actually be more suspicious if any Tyrell of importance wasn't present at the wedding. And them being the "obvious" perpetrators would also work against building suspicion since the smarter people would actually think it would be too obvious. I also think people questioning this turn of events all too easily fall for the perfect rationality trap, they think that every actor always has perfect information while considering the exact outcomes to any action taken and always go for the most rational choice, but that's not how humans work, isn't it?

I think this is just too much of a stretch. The book draws a lot of attention to the moment where Olenna reaches into Sansa's hair and messes with it, and Littlefinger alludes to this later on, completely unprompted when he's talking to Sansa. There's no way he could've heard about this moment and woven it into his explanation since he was presumably at sea preparing to pick her up while this was happening. You're right that the Tyrells being everywhere and clearly standing to gain from the situation makes them obvious suspects, but I don't think that would be enough to put them off doing it entirely, it just made them ensure that Tyrion looked extra guilty. You have Olenna incessantly mocking Tyrion's dwarfism, seemingly trying to wind him up in the hopes that he'd have some kind of public conflict with Joffrey like the one at his wedding to Sansa, and Littlefinger organising the dwarf performers for the same reason. They also probably banked on Tyrion being easy to pin it on even if there wasn't any evidence, because Tywin and Cersei would both gladly accept a chance to get rid of him even if it didn't add up (Tywin in particular would have no emotional resentment against Joffrey's killer, in fact he probably wanted Joffrey out of the way himself and may have even been involved in the conspiracy), and it was a narrative the general public would easily accept.

I think you have a lot of really great points, and you are definitely on to something! Is it possible (in the books) that Littlefinger is the one to who invites Olena to the plot to kill Joffrey? Or perhaps Olena (the Tyrells) made plans to have Joffrey killed and Littlefinger found out, but used it to his advantage. In either case, this allows Littlefinger to add extra details that work in his favor. In addition to painting the Tyrells the same as the Lannisters (as you went over so well) he could have also taken the liberty to make up Sansa’s involvement in the plot. This leaves her feeling implicated in the treason with nobody to turn to.. except for Littlefinger who makes himself out to be her savior. While I likewise feel that Littlefinger had some level of involvement (chaos is a ladder), his level of involvement may very well be different than what was shown in the show. I could easily see him as the driving force of the plot, or on the contrary someone who has the information of what *will happen* and uses the chaos to his advantage. The prophecy can always be referring to what Littlefinger will tell Sansa / the truth Sansa believes. There is a definite theme of “the truth is what we make it” in ASOIF. I subbed to your channel, will be excited to see more of your content!

If you watch closely you literally watch her take the stone from the necklace. Open your eyes.

Littlefinger has directly told you something? Okay, so that's definitely bullshit! I like the Preston theory: Littlefinger wanted to kill Tyrion/widow Sansa (bonus points of Joffrey is suspected of murdering him). So he payed the waiter to poison the creme on Tyrion's cake. Joffrey eating the cake, was a mistake, that Littlefinger tried to spinn in his favor, by asking Sansa leading questions.

Would be a cool theory if we didn't actually see Olenna grab the gem from her necklace. It was Olenna.

It always irked me why would Ollena poison her granddaughters husband who is a king, so publicly and with immense risk, whose alliance is of utmost importance. I think she would at least wait until Marg had a couple of heirs to put on the throne, to further secure their position, just like Tywin did with marrying Cercei to Bobby B. It had to have been Littlefinger, trying to kill Tyrion to widow Sansa and to create chaos. He would probably accuse dead Tyrion of actually trying to poison the king, and it somewhat backfired. I know he would find a way. Again, being the devious quick-witted master player that he is, he still found a way to "save" Sansa from the lions den and sort of keep her as his own property. He is basically slobering all over her in Vale and Sansa, being the poor and naive girl that she is, thinks that in some way, he is her "prince Charming". I've always loved his "Chaos is a ladder" speech, it really shows his true colors and how he uses the chaos to his own advantage.

You can literally see when she does it.She takes it from Sansa’s necklace then drops it in the wine

One element I find impossible to ignore is the dwarf show. Littlefinger clearly arranged it, as he described it in detail in a way he couldn't have if he weren't behind it since he wasn't there to see it, and his motivations are made very clear. He set that up to publicly create tension between Tyrion and Joffrey right before Joffrey's assassination, specifically to point the finger at Tyrion for the crime of regicide, thereby drawing eyes away from Olenna (and also if Tyrion gets executed, Sansa is freed up for marriage). That was absolutely done on purpose, and it's the same reason why Sansa was the one chosen to transport the poison to the wedding, it lays a very damning false trail. As for why involve Littlefinger at all, my guess is this originated back when he was brokering the alliance with them after the assassination of Renly, he's the kind of man whose skills make him a valuable asset, but is ultimately disposable if he'd be. Olenna is many things, but she's not someone who would throw any member of her own family to the wolves over one of her own plots, and Littlefinger makes a very useful fall guy since he's hundreds of miles away and was married to Sansa's aunt, making him actually a pretty viable suspect for who spirited her away from King's Landing (though I doubt anyone would believe he went there in person). His foremost ability is his talent at getting people to see him as a trustworthy confidant, that he's "everybody's friend". His foremost use to the Tyrells is in fabricating their cover story, they need him for his role in placing blame on Tyrion and Sansa and drawing eyes away from them. A lot of the steps you bring up in the plan are absolutely things you can control for, and indeed they do. Sansa specifically wears the hair net because of what Dontos told her at the end of A Clash of Kings, on some level she knew it was an instrument in Joffrey's downfall. Dontos all but told her that the hair net was an instrument of revenge, that it was "magic", and she pretty clearly puts weight behind that. Littlefinger, for his part, was probably involved specifically so he could grab Sansa, indeed the reason it happened during the wedding at all is probably something he insisted on specifically so he could take her, since it's pretty well noted that his primary weakness is his obsession with Cat and Sansa by extension. This is the same reason he confessed to regicide to her, he knew Joffrey was the king who took her father's head and spent all the intervening time making her life absolutely miserable, so confessing to her was something he believed would give him a lot of goodwill from her

No darling . ..not being in attendance would have made them look guilty. Olena did it, and probably with the help of Tywin. The fact that Tywin didn't burn down kings landing after a Lannister was murdered is a clue that he may have had something to do with it

The risky part could easily be overcome by the actual assassin using a 2nd vial of poison to do the job while framing Tyrian & Sansa w/ the necklace. Then it could be anyone close enough to do the deed whether the poison was in the cup or not (though I do believe the cup was likely used at this point).

Personally I think it was Tywin who killed his grandson, he absolutely saw the writing on the wall for the unstable and sadistic rule that would have happened otherwise and he is way too eager to start counseling his other grandson in the ways of leadership.

If I had been in the position of Olena - forced to take poisson - I would have told Jamie the same. Wether I was it or not.

I think the only thing we are all sure about is that Littlefinger did kill Joffery, WHY he did it, we simply don't know..... He could've been trying to kill Tyrion... He could've been trying to frame Tyrion.. He could've been trying to cause a rift between the Lannister's and Tyrrells... He could've done it as revenge for the killing of Cat.... He could've done because he woke up that morning and felt like it.... We don't know and I think that's what makes it so much fun

The only correction I would make... it wasn't a hair net on the show, it was a "jewel" off of Sansa's necklace and if you watch carefully you can see her remove it when she talks to Sansa and plays with her hair. I do agree that it seems to risky and how it played out doesn't make sense.

There is a theory about that I think is highly plausible which is that a) the poison was not in the wine but in Lord Tyrion's pie which Joffrey stole and ate and b) Joffrey was not the target of the assassination but Tyrion. Littlefinger tried to poison Tyrion because a) Tyrion knew of the lies he told Lady Catelyn about the catspaw dagger to start a war between the Starks and Lannisters and b) Tyrion was recently appointed Master of Coin and was looking into Littlefinger's accounts and would soon find evidence of his embezzlement and c) after becoming Acting Hand Tyrion began to uncover the extent of Littlefinger's control in King's Landing where almost everyone in an important position was linked in some way or the other to him. These three things taken together would paint for Tyrion a very alarming picture of Littlefinger's duplicity, reach and ambitions. As such Tyrion had to be silenced. Heres some quotes that I think support this idea: "...Littlefinger laughed. “Well said, Lannister. A man after my own heart.” Tyrion smiled at him, remembering a certain dagger with a dragonbone hilt and a Valyrian steel blade. _We must have a talk about that, and soon_ He wondered if Lord Petyr would find that subject amusing as well..." _______________________________________ In this one you see Tyrion's suspicions of Littlefinger being aroused even more "...Cersei smiled the sort of smile she customarily reserved for Jaime. “Lord Petyr, you are a wicked creature.” “Thank you, Your Grace.” “And a most accomplished liar,” Tyrion added, _less warmly_ _This one is more dangerous than I knew, he reflected_ Littlefinger’s grey-green eyes met the dwarf’s mismatched stare with no hint of unease. “We all have our gifts, my lord.”..." _______________________________________ This one outlines Littlefinger's reach: “Thank you, but no.” Littlefinger flashed his mocking smile. “Drink with the dwarf, it’s said, and you wake up walking the Wall. Black brings out my unhealthy pallor.” _Have no fear, my lord_ Tyrion thought, _it’s not the Wall I have in mind for you_ He seated himself in a high chair piled with cushions and said, “You look very elegant today, my lord.” “I’m wounded. I strive to look elegant every day.” “Is the doublet new?” “It is. You’re most observant.” “Plum and yellow. Are those the colors of your House?” “No. But a man gets bored wearing the same colors day in and day out, or so I’ve found.” “That’s a handsome knife as well.” “Is it?” There was mischief in Littlefinger’s eyes. He drew the knife and glanced at it casually, as if he had never seen it before. “Valyrian steel, and a dragonbone hilt. A trifle plain, though. It’s yours, if you would like it.” “Mine?” Tyrion gave him a long look. “No. I think not. Never mine.” _He knows, the insolent wretch_ _He knows and he knows that I know, and he thinks that I cannot touch him_ If ever truly a man had armored himself in gold, it was Petyr Baelish, not Jaime Lannister. Jaime’s famous armor was but gilded steel, but Littlefinger, ah… Tyrion had learned a few things about sweet Petyr, _to his growing disquiet_ Ten years ago, Jon Arryn had given him a minor sinecure in customs, where Lord Petyr had soon distinguished himself by bringing in three times as much as any of the king’s other collectors. King Robert had been a prodigious spender. A man like Petyr Baelish, who had a gift for rubbing two golden dragons together to breed a third, was invaluable to his Hand. Littlefinger’s rise had been arrow-swift. Within three years of his coming to court, he was master of coin and a member of the small council, and today the crown’s revenues were ten times what they had been under his beleaguered predecessor… though the crown’s debts had grown vast as well. _A master juggler was Petyr Baelish_ Oh, he was clever. He did not simply collect the gold and lock it in a treasure vault, no. _He paid the king’s debts in promises_ and put the king’s gold to work. He bought wagons, shops, ships, houses. He bought grain when it was plentiful and sold bread when it was scarce. He bought wool from the north and linen from the south and lace from Lys, stored it, moved it, dyed it, sold it. The golden dragons bred and multiplied, and Littlefinger lent them out and brought them home with hatchlings. _And in the process, he moved his own men into place_ The Keepers of the Keys were his, all four. The King’s Counter and the King’s Scales were men he’d named. The officers in charge of all three mints. Harbormasters, tax farmers, customs sergeants, wool factors, toll collectors, pursers, wine factors; nine of every ten belonged to Littlefinger. They were men of middling birth, by and large; merchants’ sons, lesser lordlings, sometimes even foreigners, but judging from their results, far more able than their highborn predecessors. No one had ever thought to question the appointments, and why should they? Littlefinger was no threat to anyone. A clever, smiling, genial man, everyone’s friend, always able to find whatever gold the king or his Hand required, and yet of such undistinguished birth, one step up from a hedge knight, he was not a man to fear. He had no banners to call, no army of retainers, no great stronghold, no holdings to speak of, no prospects of a great marriage. _But do I dare touch him?_ Tyrion wondered. _Even if he is a traitor?_ He was not at all certain he could, least of all now, while the war raged. Given time, he could replace Littlefinger’s men with his own in key positions, but…" _______________________________________ Another quote that shows that Tyrion was reviewing Littlefinger's accounts, or rather the accounts he chose to provide Tyrion: "...Even abed, he (Tyrion) worked well into the morning-reading by the flickering light of a candle, scrutinizing the reports of Varys’s whisperers, and poring over Littlefinger’s books of accounts until the columns blurred and his eyes ached..." _______________________________________ Again Tyrion smells something fishy about Littlefinger's accounts "...He (Tyrion) went back to work after she left, trying to track some golden dragons through the labyrinth of Littlefinger’s ledgers. Petyr Baelish had not believed in letting gold sit about and grow dusty, that was for certain, but the more Tyrion tried to make sense of his accounts the more his head hurt. It was all very well to talk of breeding dragons instead of locking them up in the treasury, _but some of these ventures smelled worse than week-old fish_ ..."

It wasn’t THE tyrell it was olenna who knew her son would get his daughter to be queen regardless of the abuse and violence she might have to endure.she was smart enough to not involve anyone in the family knowing her granddaughter could do with joeffrey s younger brother what she herself did with her husband who was originally promised to her sister.All the reasons your mentioned as to why it would have been stupid of them is exactly what kept suspicions away from the tyrell and olenna knew it

I think a key piece you’re missing is that Tywin knew Tyrion was innocent: he just didn’t care. Tywin, like everyone else knew, knew Joffrey was a monster who needed to go. He probably also suspected the Tyrell’s played a part but even if he wanted to act he couldn’t because the alliance was the only thing holding the realm together. So Tywin saw what happened as an essential ally took care of a problem while also giving the added bonus of letting him get rid of Tyrion. This was a win in all regards for him.

Couple of points you overlooked 1 The Tyrells have the Lannisters in their palms at that point because they are supplying King’s Landing with both food and gold ( under Master of Coin Littlefinger) 2 Everyone at court knows what Cersei is going to think before she thinks it. In the next book she’s constantly manipulated by her “allies” into doing their bidding. So the Tyrells pretty much knew that her and Tywin would jump at the chance to put the blame on Tyrion and Sansa.

I was always of the opinion it was just Olenna and Littlefinger. Yes it’s is a completely bonkers plan. But they had several things in there corner. That would give them plausible deniability. Just because a plan is crazy doesn’t mean it can’t have happened. They where likely taking advantage of an opportunity rather than making an ironclad plan.

Seems like weakening the kingdom, sowing discord and distrust are the MO's of not just Litttlefinger but of Varys and Ilyrio as well. It would play into their idea of the common people and lesser nobility looking for a return to peace and stability and Aegon, fake or no, being the answer to that.

I dunno thoug. The plan looking stupid kinda makes it genious. The Tyrells could claim the absurdity of their involvement. They only have things to lose if participating in such scheme. It's so obvious and dumb than could potencially remove attention from them. Specially when your enemy expects you to be smart, it is in a way underestimating someone. Also the Tyrells had a privileged position in the entire event: sitting with the monarch, they were part of the event. Very few people had such privilege. Baelish gets Sansa, Olenna gets a more docile in-law. Tywin could be in it as well, he gets rid of Tyrion, whom he hates, but also gets a more manageable king. He is a very pragmatic person. He even seems to consider Cersei able to give birth still. So, no real loss there. "Not now, Mace! Lord Tywin and I are speaking"

1)Olenna and littlefinger talked about the murder at the red keep right before he told her about Kevin Lannisters' kid that Cersi was having sex with and used to spike King Roberts wine when they were hunting. 2) Lady Olenna told Queen Margerie that she wouldnt let her get married to that monster 3)You can see her grab the poison off of Sansas' necklace and then look at Tyrion with pity cause she knows whats about to happen. 4)She drank the poison quickly and then admitted it to Jamie so he wouldnt cut her in half with Widows Whale (joffreys sword). I love when she says to Sansa as shes grabbing the poison that she didnt even know was around her neck "what kind of monster would kill a man on his wedding day"and then poisons Joffrey! cold as ice!

Best analysis on this subject I've found. Two Questions: how does the comment from Dontas about the hairnet being magic play in? How does the dream of the ghost of high heart about maid with serpents dripping poison play in?

I believe this was a plot to kill Tyrion gone wrong.

Watch episode 3 or 4 of S4 there's a scene where Olenna confesses to Maergery about killing Joffrey. If you follow the storyline, you would know that a) she learns from Sansa about what a monster Joffrey is and takes issue and b) she does this to prevent her granddaughter from suffering the same cruelty. Sh

It's also a callback to a book series that GRRM called "the original Game of Thrones", the historical novel series "Les Roi D'Maudit" aka "The Accursed Kings", which is about the slow decline of the Capetian dynasty of France. GRRM wrote the foreward to the English translations to the recent re-release of the books. In it, an older noble woman poisons an infant king she's carrying up the baptismal aisle as "godmother". It's well known that the infant King has been having coughing fits, so she takes advantage of that when the infant coughs by dabbing her poisoned handkerchief over the infant's mouth. Only thing is, there was unkowingly a baby swap, and all she did was kill the decoy. No matter, since the infant died at baptism, the country believes the infant king dead, and so the old woman's daughter, who is married to the uncle of the infant King, becomes Queen. She also had killed the father of the infant King, by leaving a poisoned chocolate covered almond mixed among a bowl of almonds he keeps by his bedside. She had been permitted to help set up his bedchambers along with several others prior to his arrival at the castle. So an old noble woman poisoning royalty for the benefit of her offspring, yeah that's a definite callback to The Accursed Kings.

I am a fan of Jacob Preston's theory. The target was supposed to be Tyrion, the poison was in the pie... and the whole thing was Littlefinger's plan to get rid of dangerous witness and getting Sansa.

Was Tywin poisoned in the books, is that why his body smelled unnaturally bad. Or just another theory?. The Tyrell’s and little finger poisoned jeoffry it might have not gone as smooth as they thought but it was them as stated.

I hadnt really thought of how convoluted the whole thig was, before

I am for the Tyrell/Bealish plan with a little bit of a more wrinkly wrinkle added - I think the poison was both in the pie and in the wine. The dose in the pie was the catalyst chemical, and the combination only mimicked the Strangler poison. Margery could have been drinking the wine is reasonable safety.

When Brandon stark was killed by the mad king, he had previously been betrothed to catlyn Tully. After his death, and according the Westerosi tradition, catlyn went on to marry Ned, Brandon's younger brother. It makes perfect sense for Olena to kill Joffrey before the marriage was consumated given that she was likely be certain that this would mean a marriage between Margery and Tomon (idk how to spell a lot of these names lol)

Telling Dontos to plant the red herring and then killing him to hide the truth sounds like a Littlefinger plot.

Olena Tyrrell was a mother who loved her daughter & would do anything to protect her. We've seen Circe turn the kingdom upside down to protect her children. Olena did not want her daughter to marry "that monster" Murdering him at the wedding was actually a clever idea. It gives Olena a reason to be near the king. Olena nonchalantly picked the poision crytal out of Sansa's hair net & placed it into the wine in the wedding cup. The cup was at the Tyrell table & she knew Tyrion was Jeoffery's cup barer. Tyrion literally picks up the cup & hands it to his nephew. Marjorie didn't have a chance to drink from it. Olena may have even dropped the poisoning crystal into the cup just after Jeoffery asked for it. Im also sure the Tyrelles were aware of Circe's hate for Tyrion. By poisoning the wedding cup It automatically places the blame on the cupbarer & scatteres any other suspicion on everyone else at the wedding. In the HBO series Olena says to Sansa she is sorry about her brother being killed & also says "who would kill someone at a wedding? What kind of monster would do such a thing?" About 10 minutes later Geoffery is choking to death

Commiting the murder at the wedding makes all the sense in the world for house tyrell. At any time after the wedding the bride (and by extension her family) would be the natural first suspect of any murder makeing it much harder to deny any kind of involvement. Commiting the murder at any time before the wedding might open a realistic possibility in which house lannister backs out of the entire alliance, for example to lock down access to their son and king before he gets murdered too. While at the day of the wedding both houses have already shown the full commitment to execute the alliance to the end which makes it just more convinient to just keep it up instead of turning all the wheels back that are already in motion. At the same time the wedding is also a gathering of pretty much every person in the world that could have a motive to kill joffrey with house tyrell kind of beeing the only ones to show no motivefor his murder. Additionally the plan might pose risks to fail but actually pose absolute minimal risk for house tyrell to be revealed as the people behind it. Up untill the very execution of the plan noone in house tyrell is even in contact with the murder weapon, which instead got brought into the wedding by the person with the biggest motive in the world. There is not really any proper scenario in which Olenna could have been caught red handed. while carrying the poison to joffreys glass she could just drop the tiny stone if she would get stoped and if anyone saw her meddling with joffreys drink this would be a very deniable accusation and also a very managable risk to begin with as she only has to wait until there is enough distraction to make people oversee a subtle motion. At the end the original plan was to frame sansa for it, as the person to bring in the murder weapon and escape the scene afterwards. The fight between joffrey and tyrion was mereley the distraction that was needed. Littlefingers involvment in the murder is already unquestionable as he knows all the details and has people beeing directly involved with the plot. Yet - just like always hes not just acting on his own, leaving him in the vulnerable spot of haveing both house lannister and tyrell beeing after him. With house tyrell also involved in the murder, Littlefinger has a crucial ally in the whole plot and a very powerfull entity with a very big insentive to not find the true murderer.

It was Tywin Lannister and Olenna Tyrell. Tywin told Shea to make sure she wore the necklace that had the poison. Tywin knew with Tomlin as king he would be easier to control as opposed to Joffrey who cut off Nedd Starks head. Olenna felt the same as about Joffrey and Tomlin her and Tywin conspired. Not to mention Tywin was able to get rid of Tyrion at the same time. Of course Little Finger found out from the Spider and was there to take Sansa and lie to her.

Considering there’s a scene with olenna a a and little finger talking how they killed him together im not sure how this makes sense?

I heard a theory that petyr baelish was trying to kill Tyrion so he could have access to Sansa and she could be married by Peter himself and then he would have control of the north. Apparently in the book Jeffrey died after he ate some of tyrion's pigeon pie

I don't think the "Tyrells" killed Joffrey. I think Olenna did. Mace certainly didn't know. Margaery might have (or at least been told not to drink the wine). Because Baelish told Olenna that Joff beat Sansa, and Sansa then confirmed that. She thought she was protecting her granddaughter. But I don't think she was fully "in on it" because she did want Sansa to marry Willas. I also don't think Olenna is the political genius the show made her out to be. She seems to have very little influence on her son (and trusting LF is a big red flag). I also think it's a mistake to think the plot is ABOUT killing Joffrey. His death is just a cover. LF can't take Sansa without a distraction that is Big. He also goes quite far (at least he hired Penny and her brother) to CAUSE a fight between Joffrey and Tyrion, so Tyrion would be blamed. I think that is Baelish's revenge for Tyrion using him in CoK. But I think the flimsiness of the plan is important. He's trying to make her think he's the Puppet Master and can see it all. "Look how clever I am, Cat, I mean Sansa!" But it was in Sansa's power to stop all of it, if she simply acted in a way LF didn't anticipate, and she can do that in the future.

I do think the Tyrrell plan went wrong but I think it was them. This is the third time the Tyrells trust a littlefinger plan. 1: Making Margery Queen 2: The green knight /Renlys ghost 3: The purple wedding After the success of the Renly's ghost ploy , they did have reason to believe in his schemes. I think there must have been a conversation or series of conversations between Olenna and Petyr about a back up (Tommen) to the 1st plan, making them feel like a partner. Also although the Sansa part is very haphazard, lots could have gone wrong. She is explicitly told by Dantos that the hairnet is magic and will take her home, there wasn't a chance of her forgetting or losing it. The only threat was Dantos or Sansa getting caught. Presumably he thinks the court wouldn't have prosecuted Sansa and he was relying on her youth and innocence. Or they don't go through with it, but Sansa might not have been allowed by the lannisters to not show up, he presumably has back up measures and we know he did have some agents, but who knows. I think the risks were just low enough for him to try and that's part of who he is, a gambler. The poison in the hairnet may be fake, I personally don't think that's it, but it's a fair point that Sansa in the plan only needs to think she was involved. I think he is recklous enough to do that to her but if not there were other ways of sneaking in a small crystal. Several of the King's guard apparently don't give a damn about Joffreys death, just as a start. The Tyrells were involved. The conversation about Joffreys true nature and Olenna and Margery's lack of concern is suspicious. They also for sure think something is about to change, because Olenna suggests Sansa comes to Highgarden again, she must think it will be allowed somehow after the wedding. In terms of suspicions the Tyrells are the first to call cause of death "he chocked on the pigeon pie", and Mace and Loras emphasize Margery as a target in the murder. I think the Tyrell plan was a choking, they gave Joffrey the ridiculous large goblet and Margery's job was to make sure he used it. She could have been told not to drink from it after the pigeon pie was brought out. the pigeon pie was dry and something you would need a drink for, so Joffrey was sure to drink. That was the back up, Tyrells would never have endangered Margery and it looked like she was just as vulnerable. I don't think it would have been so hard to set up given what a big distracting event it would have been, and family members around her could have been involved in ensuring she didn't drink after the poison. Tyrion, Sansa and the Red Viper would all have been adequate scapegoats in their plans had people not bought the choking excuse. I think Margery and possibly her mother and brothers were involved. But they possibly were not told exactly what would happen. She is good at acting and way too clever to want to be married to Joffrey and they seem way too sensible and caring of her. I agree that the point was to create a mess, which was Petyrs goal not theirs, he mislead them on some level. They weren't aware of the Sansa abduction part, or likely the conflict stirring between Joffrey and Tyrion (Peryr triggered it by hiring the dwarfs, Margery tried to drag him away from Tyrion, Garlen was being very kind to Tyrion) . The death was too overt for a choking, I think the poison in this scenario was Petyrs. Their reaction was their hard-line stance, from aggressively demanding justice to accusing sansa to Lady Merryweather (their companion) lying about Tyrion to ensure his guilt . I think it's suspicious how unnecessary and even illogical some of their arguments are, it makes me think it's deflection.

how about this as a plot, sansa actively participated in the poisoning. Nobody would expect her she took the necklass and smuggle it into the wedding. Which she hated joffry so much, wanted to see him dead. And she knew little finger would smuggle her out of king's landing. If we remember correctly she was going to push him off the ledge as father head stared at her.

Also, Olenna was the only other one involved, not the Tyrells as a family. She probably didn't mind the risk to her, since she's already old and this might have been her last important action.... and even more so.... the Lannisters, mostly Tywin, NEEDED House Tyrell more then they needed an unreliable mad boy king. So she had some degree of immunity to consequences. The only other person who could have put the poison in the wine in between Joffrey's toast and his death, might have been a servant who got close to the cup.... but WHY would a powerless commoner do that and risk gruesome punishment if caught? For the remainder, only Olenna, Tyrion, Sansa, Cersei, Mace, Allerie, Garlan, Tywin or Margaery could have come close enough to the cup. Take your pick for Baelish's least unlikely accomplice. The one HE most likely approached himself as an alternative ally so that they wouldn't need to implicate others from their family.... someone who cared more for Margaery's safety then for their own future.... or what little there was left of said future.... Also, don't overestimate Olenna as some sort of political mastermind. You're doing the same thing Tywin-fanboys do here. It's true that Baelish likely confessed to Sansa in order to make her feel even more isolated, but that doesn't mean that the story was automatically untrue.

Olenna Tyrell straight up said she did it...

The problem with this entire theory is...she did in fact do the deed.

14:20 You are mistaken here. LF didn't prevent Sansa's marriage to Wyllas by convincing Sansa that Tyrells were only interested in her claim. Dontos tried to do that, he told Sansa that Tyrells are only Lannisters with flowers. However, Sansa didn't believe him. Instead, LF watched closely how Sansa was being groomed by Margaery and her court ladies and gave heads up to Tywin.

I think it was either Tywin Lanister, after all he saw Joffery in his fit where he made him go to bed. Or the other theory I have is that it was Littlefinger to kill Tyrian to make Sansa a widow.

Or, it was one of many assassinations Littlefinger had in play at the time. Considering how many people were at the wedding, what % of them had a reason to want the king dead? Someone like Littlefinger isnt going to put all his eggs in one basket for something this important.

If Dontos had failed to deliver the hairnet or Sansa simply backed out of attending the wedding wouldn’t nothing have happened? I just don’t see the risk there it just means the plans are abandoned. Now if someone caught whoever in the act Of trying to deliver the poison to Joffreys cup that would be an entirely different matter.

Yea I agree, though I have to say that just the fact that it seems to make no sense for the Tyrells to help in poisoning Joffrey is a good cover for them if they did do it, because they can just easily deny it by claiming it is completely disadvantageous for them to do so when a daughter of theirs is marrying the king. Your argument is more likely though in my opinion since it makes the most sense

Another thought. I think it has to be the hairnet, maggie the frog saw a vision of a girl at a weeding with purple serpents dripping with venom in her hair...

Olenna poisoned him at a wedding because she wanted it to be public. She wanted everyone to see that margery had married joffrey, but didn't consumate it, giving her power as a queen but still allowing her to remarry.

Tywin had eight problems 1, Tyrion, his legal heir and pennance 2, Cersei interfering with his control of the King 3, Jaimie was a member of the king's guard and as such could not hold titles or be married 4, Joffrey was a threat to him 5, Being indebted to the Tyrells 6, the Martells were out for his blood 7, Sansa's marriage to Tyrion being unconsumated 8, His allies the Boltons were struggling to control the North With Joffrey death as it was... Joffrey was replaced with the much more ameniable Tommen. Cersei promised to leave King's Landing for Tyrion being found guilty leaving Tywin unfettered control over the new king. Tyrion could be disposed of legally. Jaimie promised to retire from the King's Guard for Tyrion being spared and sent to the night's watch providing Tywin with his preferred heir. The Tyrells were in a position where they had to avoid suspicion as they were the obvious suspects after Tyrion. The Martells were given a useless position of power as Judge since Mace Tyrell would vote with Tyrion no matter what, a mollifying tacting Tywin has used before to make Mace his lackey. And lastly, had Littlefinger not stolen her away Sansa would have had a hairnet full of the same poison that killed Joffrey and with one drop missing. It doesn't matter if there is no possible link between her/Tyrion, this is solid proof linking her and her husband with the crime in pretty much anyone's eyes. A plea bargain where she "confesses" that Tyrion made her wear it and he took part of it during the feast but she didn't know, honestly she didn't, could lead to her being merely banished from the capital and being sold to the Boltons cementing their alliance. Tywin is meant to be a ruthless calculating bastard and he could very much have pulled this off. Or he could have just taken advantage of the situation.

Overall it's a really good theory and I completely agree that Littlefinger tells Sansa about all this to alienate her from the Tyrells but I do want to say that all the reasons that make such an action so politically risky and borderline also provide some heavy layers of plausible deniability. Littlefinger is a known information broker so the Tyrrells know he's capable of great discretion and plus as far as they know he's not going to be stepping foot outside the Eyrie. As far as their concerned their accomplice can't come forward without implicating himself and is in to secure a position to be made to squeal on them. So there's actually very little risk especially since they likely know that Cersei's first suspect is Tyrion because Littlefinger probably told the Tyrells about their relationship.

Why are you people arguing with the author who wrote the books and the screenwriter who wrote the episode.