Warning: This post contains major spoilers from Game of Thrones‘ seventh season finale and speculation about its eight and final one.
We might have a long wait before Game of Thrones final season, but we have plenty of questions about the show’s endgame right now, and we’re not going to waste any time obsessing over them.
IS CERSEI ACTUALLY PREGNANT?
It certainly looked like she was after her meeting with Tyrion, but then it turned out that was just a master ploy by her to get her enemies to march North while she brings in massive reinforcements. Is her pregnancy real, or just a clever ruse to manipulate her brothers who know she only cares about her children?
WILL CERSEI’S SCHEMING DOOM THE LIVING?
Everyone but Cersei and Euron Greyjoy are on board with waging the only war that matters. That would be a problem no matter what, but she’s also bringing 20,000 mercenaries to Westeros to help her defeat whatever is standing after Daenerys and Jon fight the Night King. But will her power play get them all killed, her included?
WHAT ROLE DOES JAIME HAVE TO PLAY IN THE GREAT WAR?
Jaime, after calling Cersei’s veeeeery convincing bluff (*breathes into a paper bag*), abandoned her and their (supposed) child to keep his vow to fight the army of the dead. But how will one of the most famous faces in Westeros do going there on his own? And if he gets there, what role will Jaime have to play in the battle with the Night King? Might he actually redeem his honor by saving the living? Or will Daenerys exact vengeance on the man who killed her father the Mad King? And how will Jaime and Cersei’s relationship finally end?
WHAT DID SNOW IN KING’S LANDING MEAN?
Before Jaime left the unthinkable happened, it started snowing in King’s Landing. Winter had come to Westeros last season, but it seems to have come to the capital faster than we might have guessed. Is that because the Night King was so close to the Wall and the Long Night is already descending on the Seven Kingdoms? And does that mean the vision of a ruined throne room covered in snow, that Daenerys saw in her visions at the House of the Undying in Qarth, means the White Walkers will make it that far south eventually?
CAN THEON SAVE HIS SISTER YARA?
Theon owned up to his past failures to Jon, and then showed real bravery in standing up to the men who swore allegiance to his sister. But can he actually rescue Yara from his uncle Euron? Or will this mission be his last, and hers?
WILL ANYONE BELIEVE BRAN AND HIS MAGICAL ABILITIES?
Sure, Bran and Sam put the two biggest pieces of Jon’s birth puzzle together, but as Sam pointed out, now many people know what a “Three-eyed Raven is.” Having magical powers that let you see through time and getting people to believe you have those powers are two very different things. No one believed Jon about the army of the dead until they saw it themselves, but how do you make people see visions only you can see? Of course, if Bran is successful that raises other questions too.
HOW WILL DAENERYS REACT TO LEARNING JON IS RHAEGAR’S LEGAL SON, HER NEPHEW, AND RIGHTFUL HEIR?
Daenerys not only got Jon to bend the knee, she got him to [bad joke deleted], but that could be an uncomfortable situation when she learns he is her nephew. And also that he is really Aegon Targaryen and rightful heir to the Iron Throne she has desperately wanted. Will she step aside to let him rule? Will it ruin their relationship and lead to bloodshed? Or will it not matter because Targaryens have always had incestuous marriages and they can just co-rule together?
WHAT WILL HAPPEN WHEN JON BRINGS THE NORTH A NEW QUEEN?
The lords of the North named Jon their king, and he immediately went south and bent the knee to a pretty face, the pretty faced daughter of the Mad King those same lords once went to war against. Are they going to be willing to accept her as their queen? Or will they turn on her and Jon? How they react might determine if they can withstand the coming White Walker invasion.
WHAT CAN THE STARK SISTERS DO AS A TEAM?
FINALLY. After a season spent bickering, Arya and Sansa united the pack and killed one of their family’s greatest enemies. What greatness are they capable of as a team when they are working together from the start?
ARE THE CLEGANE BROTHERS DESTINED TO FINALLY BATTLE TO THE DEATH?
The Hound sure did tease a future Cleganebowl, but we’ve thought that was coming for the last two seasons and we’ve been wrong every time. But after such heavy foreshadowing in the season seven finale, would the show really not give it to us next season?
DID THE HOUND SEE A VISION OF HOW CLEGANEBOWL WILL END?
The Hound saw the army of the dead in the flames, so when he was confident about how his brother the Mountains knows how it ends for him, was Sandor speaking as someone who has seen the future again?
WHY WAS TYRION SO UPSET ABOUT JON AND DAENERYS BEING TOGETHER?
Did Tyrion think he had a chance with the Mother of Dragons? Could Jon and Daenerys’s relationship be a real problem for him? Was it just him realizing how alone he is in the world? Tyrion was willing to die for her and their cause earlier in the episode, but seeing the two of them together obviously bothered him for some reason. What was it?
WAS THAT A BLUE FIRE OR A CONCUSSIVE ICE VISERION WAS BREATHING?
Did the Night King have his new dragon breathing a blue flame, or did he breathe a cold so icy it was like bringing the world’s biggest sledgehammer to the Wall? There didn’t seem to be any melting going on, instead it was more like watching a dragon-Cyclops with Professor X on his back. But ice or fire, does it even matter?
CAN ANYONE STOP THE NIGHT KING NOW?
The largest army in the world has now passed the Wall into Westeros. Cersei is fighting a war against the rest of the living and they don’t know it, but even if she joined them can the living stop one hundred thousand dead soldiers, whose numbers will only grow as they sweep across the Seven Kingdoms and destroy the living? Is it possible to stop an un-dead dragon being ridden by a blue-eyed ice demon with magical powers?
DID SAM LEARN ANY OTHER SECRET INFORMATION IN THOSE BOOKS OF HIS TO HELP DEFEAT THE WHITE WALKERS? OR CAN BRAN FIND SOMETHING IN THE PAST THAT WILL HELP?
The living are facing a greater threat than they even did during the first Long Night, because the White Walkers didn’t have a dragon then. So is there anything written in those books Sam stole that can help them now? Or can Bran see something from the past that the First Men and the Children of the Forest did to defeat the dead? The entire fate of the living could come down to those two finding something.
THERE ARE MORE PLAYERS LEFT IN THE GAME THAN WE MIGHT HAVE EXPECTED GOING INTO THE FINAL SEASON, WHAT ROLE DO EACH OF THEM STILL HAVE TO PLAY?
Beric, Tormund, Brienne, Bronn, Podrick, Davos, the Mountain, the Hound, Gendry, Jorah, Qyburn, what awaits them? What might they contribute in the Great War, either to help the living or to harm their efforts?
We really wish we didn’t have to wait so long to get answers to these questions, but we’re going to use all that time to think about them way too much.
What questions do you have for the final season? We have plenty of time to kill until then, so tell us yours in the comments below and give us something to obsess over.
WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON IN GAME OF THRONES?
- Our Game of Thrones finale recap.
- Could Cersei become a Night Queen?
- RIP Littlefinger, a real player in the Game of Thrones.