Kit Harington (Jon Snow) and Lena Headey (Cersei) go into detail on their characters

With only a couple of weeks left before the Primetime Emmy Awards air this year, entertainment magazines are releasing their annual “Emmys” issues, focusing on the major storylines and dramas that make up this years races. The Wrap just released its issue, going through the massive awards nominations by the numbers, counting down the 50 top stories. And who better to occupy the Top Two than two of the major stars of Game of Thrones, Kit Harington and Lena Headey?

Harington gets the top slot. Jon Snow’s resurrection was *the* story of last year’s Game of Thrones off season. But it was Harington’s performance in episode 9, “Battle of the Bastards,” that earned him his first Outstanding Supporting Actor nod. According to him, this year had his “most powerful scene on paper” and he wanted to do it justice.

He does note that playing “dead” during the gap between Seasons 5 and 6 gave him a nice break from the press, and an ability to see the maelstrom that the rest of the actors have to function inside from an outsider’s perspective. (He took a particular delight in deceiving Sophie Turner, who completely bought the line about his death and sent him a letter about him leaving the show.) And although the first couple of episodes of Season 6, where Jon Snow lay dead on the table, extended that break, once he got up, the season really took off.

Harington always knew that Jon would be coming back, but before he got the specifics, he thought it might be as a changed man. “And then I got the scripts, and actually, he comes back as himself, as the Jon that everyone knows. Which at first I found disappointing.”

"But it’s more subtle than that. He has an insight into what lies beyond that very few people in his world do, and that no one in our world does—he knows that there’s no afterlife. Which does quietly drive who he is and what he wants to do."

Moving on to “Battle of the Bastards,” Harington says that it wasn’t until he got out onto the battlefield to film that the sheer scale of what they were trying to do hit him. “It was chaos, really. We had to start improvising…. that got confusing at times.”

And what about the revelation that Jon is actually the son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen? Does Harington have any theories about what that means for the character going forward?

"I do, and I never really like expressing them. If I say what my theory is, then some people will take it as gospel because I play the character. And I also find it unhelpful in playing the character to theorize about it, because he doesn’t think too much about it. If he gets to know that truth at some point, which I hope he will, it will be a really fascinating moment to play."

Meanwhile, Lena Headey said that the back half of the season, which included Cersei’s revenge on all those who’d wrong her, came as a complete surprise after the abject humiliation her character ended on last year. “To say it was a pleasant surprise is an understatement… I’m pondering where she can go from here. It can’t end well.”

Headey also touched on Cersei’s response to Tommen’s death, which was muted compared to how she reacted after the deaths of Mrycella and particularly Joffrey. “She’s so tired at this point,” Headey said. “So tired of losing, of her heart aching, that she’s just going through the motions. The point with Cersei is her utter will to survive, to achieve validation that she is something. That she has nothing left to lose is not something she considers.”

One question a lot of fans had involved that final long look Cersei and Jaime shared when she was crowned in the season finale. To Headey that was a “f*ck you moment.”

"The thing that gave her humanity was her kids. They’re gone now. Her father is gone. Tyrion is gone. There’s no one to tell her she can’t, she’s stupid, she’s just a woman. I think when Jaime looks anything other than happy, she has a “f*ck you” moment. This will be such an interesting season. Where do they go? It’s so toxic now."

Where indeed? Maybe once filming for the next season starts, we’ll get an idea.