Please be advised, if you haven’t watched last night episode, for the love of pete, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING ON THE INTERNET THIS MORNING?! RUN, SAVE YOURSELF.
Also, don’t read this article, because OMG the spoilers. THE SPOILERS.
And everywhere I go
There’s always something to remind me
Of another place and time
Where spoilers traveled far and found me
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Why spoilers? WHY?
Last night, the world of Westeros lost one of it’s most valuable, kindest, gentlest, most wonderful members: Hodor. It was one of the hardest deaths to watch in all six seasons of the show, and that’s saying something. This year has featured nothing but death everywhere we turn, as if we must pay for bringing Jon Snow back by losing multiple characters every week. But the time travel aspect, and the knowledge that the boy once named Wylis became the man we know as Hodor after having a premonition of his own death, is a sick punch in the gut.
Isaac Hempstead Wright admits to Entertainment Weekly that he wasn’t looking forward to this episode airing, not just because he and Nairn are best buds, but because there’s no way around this being anything other than Bran’s fault.
"We learned Hodor really is this vulnerable soul, who had such potential to live a happy life. First, through [Bran’s] selfish actions, going to the White Walker vision in the first place, I’ve screwed him over. He didn’t pick up that he should get out of the dream. And then Hodor sacrifices himself. He’s been through all this and he’s still having to do this…It incapsulates the Game of Thrones world — the nice guys who deserve looking after don’t always get it. It’s going to be mortifying when it airs. Bran would literally be nowhere without him."
Hempstead Wright is right to be worried. I’ve seen quite a bit of of “F*** Bran” feelings this morning. Showrunner David Benioff and DAn Weiss knew this would be tough on fans because of how tough it was on them. Says Benioff: “It’s always interesting when we do the death calls; the Hodor one was particularly tough.”
He’s not somebody you think of as a main character, but he’s slowly, stealthily become an integral association with the show. ‘Hodor’ is the one word you can say to somebody and immediately evoke the show or the books. And he’s just been quietly there in Bran’s storyline, being lovable with his delivering the hell out of many, many ‘Hodors.’ I think people will be surprised how hard it hits them emotionally.
But while the rest of us are grieving, Kristian Nairn, who plays Hodor, says he’s really happy about how he got to go out. “I couldn’t have asked for a better goodbye to a character I love. My favorite part is it ties up the question of why is Hodor “Hodor.” Why does he say the word “Hodor”? Only George R.R. Martin or David and Dan could have come up with this. It’s incredibly sad. The minute you finally learn something about Hodor, they kill him!”
As to learning about his death this season, Nairn had a sneaking suspicion, especially after some of his castmates got the script before he did. Still, he looks on the bright side of things. “(That) I made it this far is pretty good. Ned Stark only made it to episode 9!”
He also admits he doesn’t know how many times he said Hodor, but he’s pretty sure if there is a record for a character being on five seasons of a show and only saying one word, he’s a shoo-in. But he wants fans, some of whom lob so many “hodors” at him that he’s taken to grocery shopping in the middle of the night, to know there’s more to him. “I have a lot more words than ‘Hodor,'” he said.
As for the show airing, he’s not as apprehensive about it as Hempstead Wright, although he does remember back in Season 4 when his character nearly died as Craster’s Keep, when fans tweeted, “If Hodor dies, we riot.”
"It will be interesting to see. I can’t wait until it airs. It’s weird talking to you about it as I haven’t been able to talk about it for so long…I don’t see myself on screen, I see Hodor. I always talk about him in the third person. I just saw the character die and it was very sad. I think people are going to a) freak out, b) be very sad."
We are very sad this morning. Hodor!