Eight years on, why is “Hardhome” still so terrifying?

It’s hard to believe it, but as of this week, it has been eight years since the fifth season of Game of Thrones gave us the iconic Hardhome sequence, which was the first time Jon Snow sees the Night King, and the first time we really got a taste of how horrifying the White Walkers were. We’d had snippets of the White Walkers before this, like at the end of season 2 when Samwell Tarly sits cowering behind a rock as the army of the dead materializes out of an icy fog. But it was at Hardhome where we realized how deadly and terrifying this threat really was.

The Massacre at Hardhome is a nightmarish sequence out of a zombie horror film, but not overdone or unbelievable. It unfurls, slowly but surely, building up a feeling of dread in the pit of your stomach, until the storm hits and your jaw drops.

I distinctly remember the first time I watched “Hardhome.” to say I was on the edge of my seat would not be an exaggeration, muttering “No no no no no” and rocking back and forth as the stakes got higher and higher. It was Game of Thrones at its finest. So eight years on, let’s take a look back at this iconic sequence…

Good intentions turn into a hellscape in “Hardhome”

Part of what makes “Hardhome” so horrifying to watch is that it begins from a place of hope. Jon Snow and Dolorous Edd arrive at the wildling settlement of Hardhome alongside Tormund Giantsbane, who is here to vouch for Jon and his plan to forge an alliance between the Night’s Watch and the wildlings in the interest of saving all of their lives from the White Walkers. Jon proposes to resettle the wildlings just south of the Wall, so long as they promise to fight alongside him and his Night’s Watch brothers when the White Walkers attack.

Some angry words are exchanged, with both groups airing grievances built up over centuries of acrimony. But ultimately, they choose life. Some wildlings are still uncertain and choose not to go along with Jon, but a large group of them decides to follow him to safety.

And then… disaster strikes.

It builds slowly. Dolorous Edd looks up at the wildling giant Wun Wun as we hear the sound of dogs barking outside the hut. Jon and Tormund slowly turn from the dock, where wildlings are piling into rowboats which will take them to ships moored close by. As Jon looks up at the cliffs around Hardhome, the wildlings waiting on the shoreline turn too. Aided by Ramin Djawadi’s genius musical score of a slow and steady ticking in the background, the dread begins to flow.

Rolling down the cliffs is white fog, thick and viscous. Thunder breaks overhead, the sky turning even darker grey, snow falling to the ground. The camera sweeps back as we see this fog grow larger, dogs barking and whining, wildlings backing away; Jon’s eyes narrow as he tries to see what’s causing this, while other wildlings pick up weapons. Close to the cliffs, we see wildlings begin to run.

We hear the words “Shut the gate” and pandemonium breaks out. Suddenly all the wildlings are running, desperate to make it aboard the boats the Night’s Watch has brought. The earlier discussions about the pros and cons of going with Jon are thrown aside as everyone gets a visceral reminder of exactly why Jon, Edd and Tormund came here in the first place.

This chaos deepens as the gates slam shut and we see the wildlings trapped on the other side banging on the wood. All Jon and the other wildlings can do is stand and watch the fog roll down, wincing in the biting wind. We watch with them, feeling as helpless as they do.

And then the hammering against the gates grows silent. When the Thenn leader Loboda approaches the gate to see what happened, he is met with a bright blue eye (the sign of a corpse reanimated by the White Walkers) on the other side; we aren’t wholly surprised by it, but it still makes you jump out of your skin.

As the gate breaks and the undead army piles over, the camera sweeps across the settlement, showing the surviving wildlings clamoring to be let onto the boats. Arrows and swords may slow the undead, but they cannot be defeated with such basic weapons. The horror is palpable.

The White Walkers arrive

And this is all before we see the White Walkers themselves. We all know that that fog represents their arrival, but the episode has thus far kept them offscreen.

Four White Walkers finally do show up on horses on the edge of a cliff, giving off the sense that they’re the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Jon looks up, face crumpled in fear and anger, and charges headlong back into the fray to get dragonglass knives, which can be used to kill White Walkers, from one of the huts.

We get something of a classic “hero fight” between Jon and one of the White Walker generals in the hut. At one point Jon ends up lying on the ground winded, the world ringing in his ears as he struggles to stand up. Jon finally defeats the White Walker general by slashing him with Longclaw, a sword of Valyrian steel. It is in this moment that we, along with Jon, discover that Valyrian steel is also capable of killing White Walkers.

Despite this brief moment of triumph, it doesn’t feel like a win. That’s part of the genius of the Hardhome sequence. Jon barely has a moment to catch his breath before he joins everyone else and pelts down the slope towards the boats. Djawadi’s music becomes loud and impatient; we are no longer anxiously waiting for the threat to appear. The threat is here. There is nothing else to do but run. Our heroes may survive this, but it cannot be called a victory, not when so many lives have been lost.

The Night King shows himself

One of the biggest moments of the episode happens right at the very end, after everyone who can be saved has boarded the boats and we think the worst is over. After all the chaos of the episode, the quiet is unnerving. Which is the point.

Jon stands on the prow of one of the rowboats, staring across at the now desecrated Hardhome. As he stares, the camera shifts to the thudding of boots on the dock. This is a new White Walker, one who has ice growing out of his forehead in a way that resembles a crown.

Immediately, we know that this is the leader of the White Walkers, the one behind all of these attacks, the ultimate enemy to defeat in order for Westeros to be saved: the Night King. He stares at Jon, and we feel a menacing connection between the two characters immediately. Jon grimaces as he stares at the Night King, who slowly smiles.

As the Night King raises his arms, all those who died on their way to the boats are now reanimated as undead wights. That includes the wildling chieftess Karsi, who in the space of one episode alone manages to connect with the viewer so strongly that you feel real despair at her being brought back as a wight. The Night King smiles across at Jon, arms up in triumph, his army now greater than ever before.

The silence that follows forces you to sit and think about what you’ve just witnessed. Jon is alive, but the threat of the White Walkers has suddenly become painfully, powerfully real.

Is “Hardhome” the best White Walker sequence from Game of Thrones?

What makes the Hardhome sequence stand out all these years later for me is that it is the most afraid I have ever been of the White Walkers in Game of Thrones. The final battle against them in season 8 felt less terrifying than this sequence. By that point in the show, the White Walkers felt like a hurdle that needed to be cleared on the race to the Iron Throne.

In “Hardhome,” the threat of the White Walkers is taken seriously and feels horrifyingly real. All this time we have invested into being afraid of the White Walkers pays off; even though you think you know why everyone should fear the Walkers, it isn’t until you watch “Hardhome” unfold that you fully understand why they could end civilization in Westeros.

My only gripe with “Hardhome” eight years on is not about “Hardhome” itself: it’s that when you rewatch it knowing how this storyline ultimately plays out, you can’t help but feel slightly deflated. The White Walkers come off as a highly organized operation who will take more than one battle to defeat.

On the positive side, the episode itself holds up remarkably well. Every single second of the episode is thought through, every detail taken into account; which is even more impressive when you consider that the idea for “Hardhome” came from a throwaway line in the Song of Ice and Fire books. The showrunners took a brief mention of something terrible happening at Hardhome and turned it into a horror sequence which sits with you long after you watch it.

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