If there are two things that are certain about Game Of Thrones, it’s that white walkers have no chill, and everybody you love will eventually be killed off in some gruesome way or another.
On that second point, fans of the TV show were left screaming overnight by the season five finale, whose body count, high even by Thrones standards, included poor handsome Jon Snow.
In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, actor Kit Harrington addressed his character’s death, saying he had a bad feeling it was coming, but he’s at least thankful he got to be in the last scene of the finale.
He said that, for him personally, the “heartbreaking” thing is not that Jon was betrayed and stabbed to death in the line of duty, but that now, he will never find out who his mother is.
“Thrones treats drama as real life,” he said. “And people die and don’t accomplish what we think they’re meant to in real life. And I think that’s one of the powerful things about Thrones.”
Showrunner Dan Weiss says that Jon Snow is definitely, actually dead, but his fate is left somewhat open-ended in the books, and many are holding out hope that he’ll come back in some witch-y or warg-y way.
Last year, Thrones salary details leaked, making mention of the fact that Harrington would be receiving a pay bump in a sixth and possibly seventh season of the show.
When asked if Jon Snow is really dead, Harrington replied:
“This is my understanding of it. I had a sit-down with Dan and David, we did the Tony Soprano walk [letting an actor know they’re being whacked]. And they said, “Look, you’re gone, it’s done.” And as far as the salary thing goes, that angered me when that story came out. I don’t know where it came from, but it was inaccurate in many ways. It’s going to put questions into your head and into fans’ heads that things are not what they are. Quite honestly, I have never been told the future of things in this show, but this is the one time I have. They sat me down and said, “This is how it is.” If anything in the future is not like that, then I don’t know about it – it’s only in David and Dan and George’s heads. But I’ve been told I’m dead. I’m dead. I’m not coming back next season. So that’s all I can tell you, really.”
FWIW, Harrington says he cried during his last day on set. Which of your favourite characters will brutally die next?
