We Finally Know What Bran Was Doing During the Battle of Winterfell
Note: This article contains spoilers for Game of Thrones season 8.
Game of Thrones' Battle of Winterfell, as seen in season 8 episode 3 'The Long Night', was epic in scope, but was full of characters making some pretty stupid decisions.
Sending the Dothraki running off into the dark, Daenerys just standing there atop her dragon while the dead clambered up it... our heroes were just passing around that idiot ball. But Bran Stark might have been the biggest numpty of them all.
While we get that he was being used as bait to lure the Night King out, he didn't really use his Three-Eyed Raven powers to do much. Why wasn't he warging into people to tell them where to go, like a psychic taxi coordinator? What exactly was he doing?
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"As far as I understand it, he's just in the ravens," Isaac Hempstead Wright said to The NY Times.
"He's just keeping tabs on the battle. But having lots of shots of ravens flying around wouldn't be much of interest! And it would be pretty impractical for him to be like, 'Hey, Theon, can you go run over there and tell this guy to get out of the way of that guy?'
"Bran recognises that all he can do is sit there and let whatever happens, happen. We saw how quickly all their plans disintegrated! There would have been no chance of an efficient communication system."
The actor also said that he reckoned the reason for the extended look between Bran and the Night King was Bran wordlessly expressing a sort of pity for his would-be murderer.
He said: "Bran saw the creation of the Night King, or the first White Walker, or whatever. He realises that he was once just a normal guy who... didn't ask to become this raving, crazy ice killer... He was trapped into this Night King's body, and programmed to kill everyone."
We're still glad he's defeated though. Or is he?
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