[Possible spoilers for Game of Thrones seasons seven]
With every passing season, Game of Thrones‘ “Big Battle” has gotten, quite frankly, better. The Battle of the Blackwater looked incredible at the time, and the episode still holds up, but David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were working on a limited budget. That wasn’t an issue by the time “The Watchers on the Wall” and “Hardhome” rolled around. But Game of Thrones really outdid itself with last season’s “Battle of the Bastards,” which will likely go down as one of the most popular (and award-winning) episodes of the series.
How in the world can Game of Thrones top Tormund going HAM and Jon Snow crawling out of a pile of dead bodies? With a lot of horses and bald dudes, apparently. Watchers on the Wall, via Spanish language site Los Siete Reinos, recently shared an open casting call in Spain — over 8,000 people showed up, but only 450 made the final cut, including “men [who] were asked if they were willing to shave [their] beard and head because they needed many Unsullied for scenes that will be shot in Barruecos.” Filming is expected to last a month, or the same amount of time it took to shoot the Battle of the Bastards.
The Unsullied will also have some company. Los Siete Reinos reports that “it has also reached us… that [producers] are looking for many horses for these action scenes.” When there’s smoke, there’s fire, and when there are horses, there are the Dothraki, who are sailing to Westeros with Daenerys Targaryen’s Unsullied army and Varys, who prefers birds to equines.
Also, there will be dragons.
If this is the season’s “Big Battle,” with Dany on one side and Euron and Cersei on the other, it will be the first since season two’s “Blackwater” to not involve Jon Snow. It’s about time he shares the wealth. Sansa know what’s up.
(Via Watchers on the Wall and Los Siete Reinos)
