The new Game of Thrones trailer is stuffed with updates on characters across Westeros and Essos. Jon Snow is dead (for like five minutes). Jaime is as self-motivated and oddly sympathetic as ever. Lots of people are sad, especially dudes about to become burning, upside-down crucified flayed men. Melisandre expresses what may be human remorse (doubt it). Daenerys is a prisoner, but Jorah is thirsty as ever. The High Sparrow is still a pompous dick who has some good things to say about taking down the aristocracy. We’ll see how he likes Cersei and a roided out, undead Gregor Clegane. Sansa is… in a shot. Everyone’s story is heading in fascinating, but not unexpected, directions.
There’s one moment in this trailer that’s completely different. It could not have been anticipated. And it might just change everything we think we know about the Game of Thrones endgame.
Watch the trailer and spot it for yourself. Or just look at the header image and skip the trailer. BUT WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?
Bran and the Night’s King, together: the moment that will crack Game of Thrones apart.
Nah did we just see Bran about to get touched by the Night's King?
— Maud'Dib (@CombMyAfro) March 8, 2016
There’s a boring explanation for this meet-up. We know Bran has whatever Game of Thrones version of The Shining is called. In this season he’ll see the past, present and future as he develops increasing control over his powers under the tutelage of the Three-Eyed Raven (Max von Sydow!). So it’s possible we’ll learn about the mysterious Night’s King through Bran’s visions. He’ll be little more than our Scrooge proxy, enjoying illuminating visions loaded with plot points we need to know.
What if it’s more than that? Is it really possible that a being as magical as the Night’s King—who resurrected a fallen army with a wave of his hands—could be spied upon by a magical human without his knowledge?
If Bran and the Night’s King actually interact, it could substantially change the stakes of the conflict. As Game of Thrones has existed across five seasons and five books the White Walkers have always been an alien, external threat. They are the mysterious barbarians in the woods that society defines itself against. For all they’re political squabbles and warring, everyone in Westeros would agree that humans are on one side, White Walkers on another.
Should Bran and the Night’s King speak that entire dynamic could be upset. What if the White Walkers have as sympathetic a motivation as the wildlings? Perhaps the Night’s King was once human and still has utterly explicable human motives.
If Bran’s meet-up with the Night’s King is more than mere vision, then Bran could even side with the Night’s King, could help him understand the human society from which he’s been banished. Or he be an intermediary, filtering knowledge and communiques back and forth across the barrier between the living and the dead.
Whatever’s going on between Bran and the Night’s King, it’s likely to change the future course of Game of Thrones. The mysterious threat of the White Walkers has been nebulous enough to be unassailable. Up until this moment the scale of the threat is unknown, obscured and might as well be limitless. Once an enemy begins to take shape, the opponent bends to the new understanding, its own identity reshaping in contrast. We define ourselves in opposition to others. How will knowing the White Walkers redefine Westeros?
When Bran and the Night’s King hear each other out Game of Thrones will never be the same again.
