[♪♪♪]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[SAMWELL SHIVERING]
NORTHMAN 1: Oi!
NORTHMAN 2: Mind out.
Move!
[♪♪♪]
[MEN CHATTERING INDISTINCTLY]
NORTHMAN: Look, on the west wall!
SOLDIER: Get down to the crypt!
[BABY CRYING]
SOLDIER: Just hold.
MAN: We'll take him.
-Come on, help the lads! SOLDIER 1: Yes, my lady.
LYANNA: Quickly, now! Quickly! Get those in position.
SOLDIER 1: Come on. SOLDIER 2: Close the gate!
SOLDIER 3: That's it.
[♪♪♪]
[GRUNTS]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[EXHALES HEAVILY]
[GASPS SOFTLY]
[DRAGON ROARING]
[SOLDIERS SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY]
[HORSES SNORTING]
[CLEARS THROAT]
Oh, for fuck's sake. You took your time.
[HORSE NEIGHS]
[SNORTING]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[DRAGONS GROWLING]
[♪♪♪]
Do you speak their tongue?
Tell them to lift their swords.
[WIND WHISTLING]
[SPEAKS IN DOTHRAKI]
[WEAPONS CLINKING]
[♪♪♪]
[SPEAKING IN HIGH VALYRIAN]
[SOLDIERS EXCLAIMING]
[♪♪♪]
Valar morghulis.
Valar dohaeris.
Open the gate!
SOLDIER 1: Open the gate!
SOLDIER 2: Open the gate!
MAN 1: Come. Come on.
Easy.
[♪♪♪]
There's no need to execute me, Ser Davos.
I'll be dead before the dawn.
[♪♪♪]
[SOLDIER SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY]
[DOTHRAKI ULULATING]
SOLDIER [IN DOTHRAKI]:
[WIND WHISTLING]
[HOOFBEATS POUNDING]
[NEIGHS HOARSELY]
[♪♪♪]
[HORSES NEIGHING]
[GASPS]
The Night King is coming.
The dead are already here.
[DRAGON ROARS]
[♪♪♪]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[GREY WORM SPEAKS IN VALYRIAN]
[UNSULLIED GRUNT]
[SOLDIERS GRUNTING]
[WIGHTS SNARLING]
[YELLS]
Stand your ground!
[SOLDIERS CLAMORING]
[SCREAMS]
[GRUNTS]
[SCREAMS]
[♪♪♪]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[♪♪♪]
ARYA: Get down to the crypt.
SANSA: I'm not abandoning my people.
ARYA: Take this and go.
I don't know how to use it.
Stick them with the pointy end.
[♪♪♪]
[SOLDIERS GRUNTING]
[SOLDIER SHOUTS INDISTINCTLY]
SAMWELL: Edd!
[WHIMPERING]
EDD: Sam, get up!
[GASPING]
Oh, God. Sam.
[SNARLS]
WOMAN [SCREAMS]: Edd!
[DOOR CLOSES, THEN LOCKS]
[PEOPLE WHISPERING INDISTINCTLY]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[JON GRUNTS]
[DAENERYS GRUNTS]
[JON GRUNTS]
[♪♪♪]
Fall back! Fall back!
Fall back!
SOLDIER: Come on!
Open the gate!
SOLDIER 1: Open the gate!
SOLDIER 2: Let us in!
SOLDIER 1: Open the gate!
SOLDIER 3: Open the gate!
SOLDIER 4: Keep moving!
SOLDIER 5: Come on!
LYANNA: Keep moving, fast. SOLDIER 5: To your posts.
SOLDIER 6: Go! SOLDIER 7: Keep moving!
SOLDIER 1: Come on, run!
Keep moving!
[IN VALYRIAN]
[UNSULLIED GRUNT]
[SOLDIERS CLAMORING]
[♪♪♪]
Dany!
[WIND WHISTLING]
SOLDIER 1: Grab your weapon now!
SOLDIER 2: Guard the barricades!
SOLDIER 3: Through that pass!
BRIENNE: Hey! Hey! Hey!
SOLDIER 4: Close up the gaps!
Go! Hey! Go! Go!
Get in! Get in!
Get in! Come on!
[GREY WORM SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY]
[UNSULLIED GRUNTING]
[♪♪♪]
SOLDIER 1: Move!
[SNARLING]
[SOLDIER WHIMPERING]
SOLDIER 1 [IN VALYRIAN]:
SOLDIER 2 [IN VALYRIAN]:
SOLDIER 1 [IN ENGLISH]: Come on! SOLDIER 2 [IN ENGLISH]: Come on!
SOLDIER 1: Come on! SOLDIER 3: Come on!
LYANNA: Protect the gate!
SOLDIER 1: Protect the gate!
They're coming! Come on!
Fall back!
[PANTING]
Light the trench!
SOLDIER 2: Wait! SOLDIER 3: Light the trench!
[GRUNTS]
[♪♪♪]
She can't see us.
Light the trenches!
SOLDIER 1: With a torch, light the trenches!
-Right there. SOLDIER 2: Torch it!
Light the trenches!
[GRUNTING]
[SNARLING]
[SHOUTS INDISTINCTLY]
[SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY]
[UNSULLIED GRUNT]
[MAN SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY]
[SPEAKS IN VALYRIAN]
[UNSULLIED GRUNT]
[SPEAKING IN HIGH VALYRIAN]
[♪♪♪]
[SCREECHING]
[SOLDIERS SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY]
Clegane.
[BABY CRYING]
WOMAN [SOFTLY]: You must try not to worry yourself.
[SIGHS] At least we're already in a crypt.
If we were up there,
we might see something everyone else is missing.
Something that makes a difference.
-[SCOFFS] -What?
Remember the Battle of Blackwater?
I brought us through the Mud Gate.
And got your face cut in half.
And it made a difference.
If I was out there right now...
You'd die.
There's nothing you can do.
You might be surprised at the lengths I'd go
to avoid joining the Army of the Dead.
I could think of no organization less suited to my talents.
Witty remarks won't make a difference.
That's why we're down here, none of us can do anything.
It's the truth.
It's the most heroic thing we can do now...
look the truth in the face.
Maybe we should have stayed married.
You were the best of them.
What a terrifying thought.
It wouldn't work between us.
Why not?
The Dragon Queen.
Your divided loyalties would become a problem.
MISSANDEI: Yes.
Without the Dragon Queen, there'd be no problem at all.
We'd all be dead already.
[WIND WHISTLING]
They lit the trench.
Bran...
I just want you to know...
I wish--
The things I did--
Everything you did brought you where you are now.
Where you belong.
Home.
I'm going to go now.
Go where?
[♪♪♪]
[RAVENS CAWING]
[♪♪♪]
Man the walls!
SOLDIER 1: Man the walls!
SOLDIER 2: Man the wall!
Man the walls!
Come on!
Get out there! Get moving!
Come on. Come on! Come on!
Go, go, go!
BRIENNE: Come on!
[ROARS]
SOLDIER 1: They're against the wall!
Get more men up here!
-Fill the gaps, quickly! -Get in there!
SOLDIER 2: They're climbing the walls!
-Relieve the archers! SOLDIER 2: Relieve the archers!
Archers on top!
SOLDIER 1: Move up! SOLDIER 2: Go, go! Come here!
-Come on! SOLDIER 3: Move back!
SOLDIER 4: Stand away! SOLDIER 2: Go on, go on. Go! Go.
SOLDIER 3: Step back. SOLDIER 4: All the way, archers!
[SPEAKS IN VALYRIAN]
[SNARLING]
SOLDIER 1: Hold the wall!
SOLDIER 2: The wall, they're coming up!
SOLDIER 3: Hold the wall! SOLDIER 4: Hold the wall!
Draw!
Come on!
[♪♪♪]
[YELLS]
SOLDIER: They're coming up!
Look out!
[WHIMPERING]
[SHUDDERING]
[♪♪♪]
[YELLS]
[GRUNTING]
Clegane!
[SCREAMS]
[GRUNTS]
BERIC: Clegane!
Clegane, we need you!
You can't give up on us.
Fuck off! We can't beat them.
Don't you see that, you stupid whore?
We're fighting Death!
They can't beat Death.
Tell her that.
[PANTING]
[SCREAMING]
[GASPING]
[YELLS]
[ROARS]
[♪♪♪]
[DAENERYS WHIMPERING]
[GRUNTING]
[♪♪♪]
[PANTING]
[FOOTSTEPS]
[♪♪♪]
[WIGHT CROAKS]
[SNARLING]
[GASPS SOFTLY]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[SNARLING IN DISTANCE]
[BREATHING SHAKILY]
[SNARLING]
[PANTING]
[WIGHTS SNARLING IN DISTANCE] [MEN YELLING IN DISTANCE]
[DOOR THUDS]
[ALL GASPING]
SOLDIER 1: Open the door!
SOLDIER 2: Open the door!
SOLDIER 3: Come on! SOLDIER 4: Open the door!
Open the door!
Please!
Open it!
[SOLDIERS SCREAMING INDISTINCTLY]
[SCREAMING FADES]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[OBJECT CLATTERS IN DISTANCE]
-[OBJECT THUDS] -[GASPS]
[WIGHTS SNARLING IN DISTANCE]
[SCREAMING]
Rah!
Aah!
[GRUNTING]
Come on! Go!
-Come on! BERIC: Run!
We've gotta go!
[♪♪♪]
[PANTING]
[SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY]
MELISANDRE: The Lord brought him back for a purpose.
Now that purpose has been served.
[♪♪♪]
I know you.
And I know you.
You said we'd meet again.
And here we are.
At the end of the world.
You said I'd shut many eyes forever.
You were right about that too.
Brown eyes...
green eyes...
and blue eyes.
[WIGHTS SNARLING AND THUDDING ON DOOR]
What do we say to the God of Death?
Not today.
[♪♪♪]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[WIGHTS SNARLING]
[GASPS SOFTLY]
Here they come!
Steady, lads.
Steady now.
Make every shot count.
[♪♪♪]
MAN 1: Over there!
MAN 2: There!
[♪♪♪]
JON: Get off.
[GRUNTING]
[JON GRUNTS]
[GROANS]
[PANTING]
[ROARS]
[DRAGON ROARING]
[♪♪♪]
Dracarys.
[♪♪♪]
[DAENERYS GRUNTS]
[♪♪♪]
[PANTING]
[WIND WHISTLING]
[ALL GRUNTING]
[♪♪♪]
[JON YELLS]
[WIGHTS RUSTLING]
[GASPS]
[SNARLING]
[BABY CRYING]
[PEOPLE SCREAMING]
Come on! Come on!
No! No, no, no!
[GRUNTING]
[♪♪♪]
-Bran! DAENERYS: Go!
[WIGHTS SNARLING] [DROGON ROARING]
[DROGON SCREECHES]
[GRUNTS]
[WHIMPERS]
[♪♪♪]
[YELLING INDISTINCTLY]
[GRUNTS]
[SAMWELL SCREAMING]
[HISSING AND SNARLING]
[YELLS]
[SCREAMING]
[PANTING]
[♪♪♪]
[EXHALES SHARPLY]
[DRAGON ROARS]
[GRUNTS]
Jorah!
[ROARING]
[GRUNTS]
[YELLS]
[SNIFFLING]
[GASPS]
BRAN: Theon.
You're a good man.
Thank you.
[YELLING]
[GRUNTING]
[GRUNTS]
[VISERION ROARS]
[YELLS]
[GRUNTS]
[GASPS]
[♪♪♪]
I'm hurt.
[♪♪♪]
[SOBBING]
[GROWLING SOFTLY]
[♪♪♪]
(FIRE CRACKLING)
♪ (DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYS) ♪
DAENERYS TARGARYEN: We have won the Great War.
Now, we will win the last war.
(CHEERING)
♪ (MUSIC INTENSIFIES) ♪
DAENERYS: We'll rip her out root and stem.
-(WHIMPERS) -MAN: Mind out!
Move.
We've been building towards this for so long now.
You think back to the very beginning
of the very first episode,
and it's beyond the Wall where the White Walkers are stalking.
They're a group of rangers.
So, this is the culmination of one of the key storylines
in-- in the whole show.
And this is for everything.
We've been talking for a long time,
how Night King's forces have been growing in power,
and most of the living have been kind of
openly disdainful of the threat, and now there's no choice
but to fight it.
♪ (DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
DAVID BENIOFF: I really love the way
the first ten minutes or so plays out,
because there's so much tension
before there's any encounter with the enemy.
BOY: Come on!
(INDISTINCT SHOUTING)
BENIOFF: You know, as much as they try to conceal it,
people are terrified, because this is...
this is death coming for them.
You know, so much of it is just kind of, on one hand,
setting the mood for the episode,
and the other hand, showing us where these characters are gonna be.
The entire episode takes place in Winterfell.
And you have 19 or 20 characters all involved
in a very chaotic situation,
that needs many, many locations to service it.
BENIOFF: Because it's such a long battle in this episode,
it's important that we feel the ebb and flow.
And so, there are moments when you think things
are going a little bit better for the living.
Tell them to lift their swords.
We felt like it was important to have that moment of hope,
when Mel comes in and lights up their arakh,
and they all ride off into battle.
(SPEAKS VALYRIAN)
(SOLDIERS GASP)
(INDISTINCT SHOUTING)
D.B. WEISS: We wanted our characters to feel, like,
that this-- maybe this is all gonna work out,
maybe things are all gonna be okay.
We've seen how devastating a Dothraki charge can be just with their regular swords,
and now when they're galloping into combat
with, uh, flaming arakhs, it's-- it's--
Uh... What could possibly stand against that?
(HORSE WHINNIES)
BENIOFF: What they see is just
the end of the Dothraki, essentially.
WEISS: They have a plan, and it's important
to wait for the Night King to reveal himself,
and then have two dragons against one dragon,
and a really good chance of-- of defeating him.
One thing that they couldn't have foreseen
was Daeny's reaction to seeing the Dothraki decimated.
Jon is the person who wants to stick to the plan,
but the Dothraki are not Jon's;
they're not loyal to Jon, they're loyal to Daeny,
and I think that Daeny can't bring herself to just watch them die,
and so the plan starts to fall apart
the second she gets on her dragon,
so he does too, and then we take it from there.
♪ (TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪
(SNARLING)
BENIOFF: We knew this episode was gonna be almost entirely battle,
and that can get really boring really quickly.
You can watch it for a certain number of minutes
before the effect starts to dampen.
Part of it was making sure that we really stayed focused on the characters,
and so whether it's Arya's storyline,
or Sansa and Tyrion down the crypt,
or Jon Snow and Daeny up on the dragons.
Kinda like all these separate little battles within the...
within the greater battle.
-(SWORDS CLANKING) -(SNARLING)
Lyanna Mormont was supposed to be a one-scene character,
and then we met Bella Ramsay,
and we realized that we would not be doing our jobs
if we kept her as a one-scene character.
My mother wasn't a great beauty or any other kind of beauty.
She was a great warrior, though.
She died fighting for your brother, Robb.
WEISS: We knew that you can't give a--
a big death to everybody who dies in this battle,
'cause it would've-- It just would've been too much,
but there-- Also, if she were to die,
there was no way to-- to not make a moment of it, so...
that's where the zombie giant comes in.
It just did add a whole level of complexity
to that moment, that I'm sure a lot of people
would've been okay with not having there,
if we had demanded to cut it,
but I think they also understood why we needed
to give one of the strongest smaller people in the show
a chance to go out taking down
one of the strongest larger things we've, uh,
we've ever seen in the show.
-(LYANNA SCREAMS) -(ZOMBIE GIANT GROWLS)
(ARYA SHRIEKS)
WEISS: In any situation where people are fighting,
Arya needs to play a central role,
'cause she's one of the best at it,
and she's one of the most fun to watch doing it.
-(ARYA GRUNTS) -BENIOFF: Even for Arya,
she can't take on a horde of wights by herself,
and especially when her head gets smacked,
she's no longer at 100 percent.
It's just about survival at that point.
WEISS: Otherwise, she's completely unstoppable,
and she never loses her cool,
and it's amazing, and it's a lot of fun to watch,
but it's also-- it's one note,
so we decided that almost rewinding the clock on who Arya Stark is
to back before she became this sort of magical figure that she's become
would really be interesting,
and would also give us a chance to change up
the nature of the story we were telling.
We talked about Winterfell as kind of the home for the show,
and, uh, one of the things that always struck us
as a horrific aspect of this is that these hallways
and rooms where we spent a lot of good times
and-- and quiet times with characters that we care about,
has now become a horror set,
because it's been invaded by undead soldiers.
(SNARLS)
WEISS: Before that point,
there's sort of an agoraphobia to the whole thing
where you have this giant wide-open space
and everywhere you look you-- there's something
that could be coming to kill you.
Once you get inside Winterfell, everything contracts,
and the-- the walls literally start to close in around you,
and something is there in the dark with you,
but you don't know exactly where it is.
And we thought that the pace change
and the tonal change was really important
to have that in this episode,
otherwise the episode would start to feel...
would start to feel monotonous.
Dracarys.
WEISS: We thought it was important that,
whatever the plan was, that it not just work out,
'cause that would be kind of dull.
While there's no reason to know for certain that
the fire wouldn't kill or destroy the Night King,
there's also no particular reason to believe that it would.
And then, a few moments after this happens,
the Night King brings them a whole new,
larger undead problem by taking all of their own
who have been killed in the course of this battle,
and turning them into the enemy.
BENIOFF: I mean, we talked about various endings for Jorah
for a long time, but, you know, you think about Jorah,
from the very first time we met him, he was with Daeny,
and from that time, he's been mostly by her side.
Part of Jorah's tragedy is
that he was in love with a woman who couldn't love him back,
but he's accepted that for quite a long time,
at the same time he was going to fight for her
as long as he could and as well as he could.
There'd never been a moment where she more needed someone
to fight to protect her than this moment.
And if he could've chosen a way to die,
this is how he would've chosen to die.
So, it was something we thought would be powerful to give him.
-(DAENERYS SOBS) -(DRAGON EXHALES)
BENIOFF: The reason the Godswood was chosen
is because it's such a source of power
for those who believe in the old gods, and for Bran in particular,
so we know the weirwood tree and the three-eyed raven
have a very deep connection.
That was always the location where Bran was going
to be waiting for the Night King.
I just want you to know...
-the things I did-- -Everything you did
brought you where you are now.
Where you belong.
Home.
WEISS: It's not like the show is entirely about
people redeeming themselves and then it's all over,
but if you-- if the canvas is big enough,
there are spaces for those redemptive moments.
I think what was really important for Theon
at the end was hearing that thank you from Bran,
because Bran knows what's gonna happen.
BRAN: Theon.
You're a good man.
Thank you.
He knows he's dead, he knows he's not gonna be able
to kill the Night King, but I think what's really heroic
about his action is that we're all gonna die,
and we know we're not gonna be able to defeat death at the end,
but, you know, it's-- it's how you face those final moments,
and he chooses to run straight at it,
and I think he dies in a way that, um, makes us
really proud of him and the journey he's gone through.
-(ARYA SCREAMS) -BENIOFF: For--
God, I think it's probably three years now or something,
we've known that it was gonna be Arya
who delivers that-- that fatal blow.
WEISS: She seemed like the best candidate,
provided we weren't thinking about her in that moment.
One of the great things about having this many people
you care about in a sequence together
is that it can kind of pull people's attention
and focus to people that they care about a lot,
like Jon, like Daeny, Theon, and Bran,
not to mention Tyrion and Sansa in the crypt,
so you're going all over the place
with people who you're desperately worried for,
and, uh, hopefully you forget about the fact that
Arya Stark ran out of that castle
with the battle drums playing,
going towards some purpose,
and we don't know what until it happens.
BENIOFF: We hoped to kind of avoid the expected,
and Jon Snow has always been the hero,
the one who's been the savior,
but it just didn't seem right to us, for this--
for this moment.
We knew it had to be Valyrian steel, to the exact spot where
the child of the forest put the dragonglass blade to create the Night King,
and he is uncreated by the Valyrian steel.
At the end of it, it's still--
It's a victory for the living, but at great cost,
because some of our favorite characters fall along the way.
WEISS: We knew from the beginning,
once we'd handed the outline in, what we were in for.
The director, Miguel Sapochnik, took what we were doing
and defined this episode.
Miguel did a tremendous amount of
heroic heavy lifting on this front.
He knew that if the planning wasn't there,
we never would've ended up with the consistent excellence
that he delivered.
It is to their immense credit that--
not only that they endured it, um,
but that they did such a great job the whole time they were there.
WEISS: It's a real testament to the entire Belfast crew
who gave us something that no amount of money could ever buy.