As I have often done before a new season of Game of Thrones, I thought I would make a few predictions as to what we might see when Season 7 begins this July.
We have already heard a few things, and can guess a few more based on the bits and pieces that we have been shown in the teaser trailers, some clues that have slipped out, and on the logical progression of the story.
First off, we already know that there are supposed to be only 13 episodes left that will shown in two seasons, at least as far as we know. Of course, it’s still possible that Season 8, the final season, could be longer. But let’s talk about Season 7 for the moment.
The recently released teaser shows us a few things.
The things that got my attention immediately:
- We see everyone in their throne rooms: Jon Snow in the main room of Winterfell; Daenarys in what appears to be the throne room of Dragonstone; and Cersei in the (remodeled with Lannister Lions) throne room in the Red Keep.
- We see what certainly foreshadows both the arrival of winter in King’s Landing and the arrival of the White Walkers in Westeros. I cannot imagine that the candles blowing out, the visible cold breath of Cersei, and of course the close up of the blue White Walker eyes means anything else.
So the teaser would seem to indicate that these three rulers are going to play major roles in the next season, which would seem pretty obvious. But what is not quite as obvious is how the three of them will interact with each other, particularly in light of the coming winter and the threat of the White Walkers and their army of the dead.
Something that has happened in every season so far is the introduction of new characters. I am not sure what new characters will appear in Season 7, but at this point there aren’t a lot of possibilities, to be perfectly honest. One we have heard about recently is someone we met in Book Five: Alys Karstark. There are some theories about how Lady Stoneheart may finally make an appearance in Season 7, and while the idea does appeal to me, I have not seen anything yet which convinces me that it will happen. I imagine that some of the Maesters from the Citadel will appear as characters too, and there has even been a rumor that GRRM himself may make an appearance as a Maester. There is also a fairly good chance that we will finally see Arya’s direwolf Nymeria, the last surviving direwolf aside from Ghost, finally make a reappearance.
And if we include flashbacks, then there is indeed a way to introduce many new and important characters, and some of those would be pretty famous characters we have heard so much about: Prince Rhaegar; the Mad King; Elia Martell; the Pyromancer; and of course younger versions of a great many of the characters that have already appeared on the show.
Of course, there are also deaths in most seasons, and we can probably make a few predictions about who is likely to die in Season 7.
- Lady Melisandre. We know she is headed south from Winterfell, and we know that Arya, who has now returned to Westeros, very much wants to kill her. As Arya heads north to Winterfell, it seems quite possible that she will reunite with her wolf in the Riverlands. So between Arya’s considerable Faceless Man skills and her now grown up direwolf, I don’t imagine that Lady Melisandre would stand a chance. I would say 70/30 that she dies in Season 7.
- Dolourous Edd Tollett (and the Nights Watch in general). Edd is hilarious and his character is well fleshed out and I will miss him. But I think that it is highly likely that the new Lord Commander of the Nights Watch will not survive the onslaught of the army of the dead once they are able to pass south of the wall, which is going to happen, one way or another. I expect the Nights Watch to be overwhelmed and annihilated. I hope they put up a hell of a fight. And since in the books the Night’s Watch is reinforced by Wildlings, I expect that will happen now in Season Seven. I can certainly see how Jon Snow will do everything he can to help the Nights Watch. I would put the odds of him dying at 90/10.
- Lord Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish. I can’t imagine that Arya will be thrilled to find out that this man betrayed her family so many times, and I bet she will find out sooner or later. And of course Sansa already knows that he betrayed her once when he turned her over to the Boltons. There are few characters left who truly deserve to die, and Baelish is definitely one of them. But still, there is a good chance we will not die until Season 8. I think it’s about 50/50 at this point.
- Lord Robin Arryn. Robin is a fairly weak-minded young man, and his stepfather “Uncle Petyr” seems able to manipulate him at will. In fact, Littlefinger seems to be able to use the Westerosi version of the Jedi mind trick on Robin fairly easily. But he still stands between Littlefinger and what Littlefinger really wants, which is, as he has often said himself, “everything”. So he will have to go at some point. I would put it at 60/40 for his death in Season 7.
More to follow later.
-Geoff
The Books are Taking Over... 
Ah, the predictions begin! We’ll see how things turn out, I think you have some good guesses here (props on assigning confidence levels to the predictions…)
Hey man! Yeah, I have been meaning to do more ASOIAF/GoT writing, and figured that writing a post about predictions might be an easier one to write. There’s a lot of stuff I did not cover, and I expect that may give me room to write a second prediction post sometime. I have some ideas about Sam Tarly and Jorah Mormont I’d like to talk about, for starters.
-Geoff
Nice! This time of year, we book readers in the office would make the show watchers make up lists of predictions, and then we’d grade them at the end of the season.
This year, the show is far ahead of the books, so the book readers are making predictions that the show watchers will be able to grade.
It’s a level playing field now…