Ellie Kendrick talks about Meera Reed’s development

It is a truth that no one has actually acknowledged that when a main, or at least B-level, character is on their last go round for Game of Thrones, the actor does a huge number of interviews. That’s what Natalie Dormer (Margaery) did before Season 6. Ahead of Season 5, Kit Harington was everywhere at once as part of his Jon Snow-is-going-to-die this season act. Ahead of Season 4? It was Jack Gleeson (Joffrey Lannister Baratheon.) Ahead of Season 3, it was Richard Madden (Robb Stark.) And on and on, all the way back to Season 1 and Sean Bean.

This year, Ellie Kendrick (Meera Reed) has been hitting the pavement a lot. Although to be fair, she gave most of those interviews during the same two-day period when she was at HBO’s interactive Game of Thrones event in New York City a couple of weekend’s back, so I wouldn’t worry too much. While there, she spoke to Screen Anarchy about Meera’s development over the course of the series.

"I think we’ve seen Meera go through a real process of character development. She has no idea what she’s getting herself into when we first see her. She’s there with her brother, she’s young and tough, and she’s got an axe to grind with Osha; she gets pretty shirty and knows the way that she thinks things should be done….. Gradually members of their party start peeling off and she loses everything that’s dear to her, you know? She’s away from her home. All of their group has slowly dwindled. Her brother has died. She wasn’t able to save him, and of course, that changes her massively."

Meera is one tough character—Kendrick says her semi-samurai moves were taught to her for the show by a former Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle actor. But her experiences last season—being unable to defeat the wights and nearly losing Bran the same way she lost Hodor and her brother—has done something “pretty crazy to {her} head.”

"And that feeling of helplessness is something that is really different to the young, more idealistic, more headstrong Meera that we see in the beginning, who thinks that she can change everything. Then we get to a sense of more despondence and trauma by the end of it, I think, by the end of season six that we’ve seen. Yeah, it’s quite a big arc. She’s had a lot of bad stuff that’s happened to her. She has to put up with a lot."

So what does the future hold for Meera? Will we ever make it to her home in the Neck, or meet her father Howland Reed? Was it just a strange coincidence that Meera and Jojen Reed, the children of Ned’s best friend, and the only man who knew the truth of what happened at the Tower of Joy, found Bran all those seasons ago?

We’ll just have to wait for Season 7 to learn the truth.