WARNING: Game of Thrones season eight spoilers will be found below.
No actor has enjoyed being killed off a monumentally popular series as much as Game of Thrones‘ Vladimir Furdik. At least the actor who played the Night King almost made the entire run, so that might add to his goodwill. He’s been dropping enthused interviews right and left about his character’s motivations, and now one of his Twitter fan pages is getting in on the game.
Three episodes remain in the epic HBO series, and as you’re probably already aware, Arya Stark scored the biggest kill by taking out the White Walkers’ creator during the Battle of Winterfell. Yes, she used the pointy end of Littlefinger’s sword with a well-rehearsed move by dropping the weapon, catching it with her other hand, and doing the deed. Maisie Williams did all of her own stunt work here, and here’s a behind-the-scenes clip of her stunt work.
https://twitter.com/Vladimir_furdik/status/1123547995948093441
The seemingly indestructible, yet ridiculously slow-walking undead master barely knew what hit him. Too bad for him, since the Night King never got his desired revenge on humanity, but good news for the audience at home, who can now watch Arya move on to possibly check Cersei off her kill list.
It’s no wonder that people are now obsessed with doing the Arya Challenge, minus the leap. Stunt coordinator Rowley Irlam recently told Huffington Post that Williams has actually been training for the Night King scene, whether she knew it or not, since the beginning of the series:
“[T]he training of Maisie has been ongoing since the show started — before I even started. They’ve been sowing the seed of that story since the very beginning of Season 1. When I joined in Season 5, you know, she was — we were starting to do her entering the House of Black and White and the start of her training … So that’s been ongoing. And then obviously we’ve done wire work with her before; in Season 6 she jumped over a balcony, escaping. So it was still a challenge, but she’s very good on a wire, and very confident and very professional.”
How will these skills hold up against the Golden Company? We’ll find out more on the next Game of Thrones episode, airing at 9:00pm EST on Sunday.
