It's one of those
"Did I really see that?"
TV moments in season eight, episode three
of "Game of Thrones."
We see Arya jumping towards the Night King
and stabbing him in the heart with
a Valyrian steel dagger.
Showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss
claim that they have known for years
that she would be the one to kill the Night King.
But you might not have spotted all the clues
that they put in other episodes.
We're going to break it down for you.
Right from the start in season one, episode one,
Arya is introduced to us as a force
to be reckoned with,
while her brother Bran is set up
to not be a great warrior.
Arya comes in with a sneak attack and hits the target.
Season one, episode two, Arya is bestowed
with her first weapon, Needle, by Jon.
Jon's advice is:
Stick 'em with the pointy end.
Ju: This line is repeated in "The Long Night."
Stick 'em with the pointy end.
Ju: Arya's teacher after Jon was Syrio Forel,
who taught her to be fast,
coining the phrase,
"What do we say to the god of Death?
Not today,"
which again was repeated in "The Long Night."
Ironically, in her first lesson with him,
he throws a sword towards her,
which she fails to catch.
Tomorrow you will catch it.
The Catspaw Dagger's journey through
the seasons is actually a clue in itself.
It makes an early appearance in season one.
A mysterious assassin tries to murder
Bran with it, but Catelyn Stark protects him.
So Catelyn takes it to King's Landing
where she shows it to Littlefinger.
He frames Tyrion, which then turns
into the War of the Five Kings.
Ned Stark has it,
then loses it to Littlefinger
when he betrays him,
leading to Ned Stark's death,
which then sends Arya on her long journey
to becoming a bada-- assassin,
only for Littlefinger to give it back
to Bran at the same location
it is first introduced.
This is for you.
Ju: In season seven, episode one, that exact
dagger shows up in one of the books
that Sam is reading in the Citadel in Oldtown
to find out how to defeat the army of the dead
and the Night King.
Melisandre meets Arya in season three, episode six,
telling her:
I see a darkness in you,
and in that darkness, eyes staring back at me.
Ju: This is the prompt Melisandre uses again
in season eight, episode three to send her
over to the weirwood tree.
In season four, Arya picks up
a few tips from the Hound.
In their travels across Westeros,
he teaches her to look for weak spots in armor
and also how to stab someone in the heart.
In season six, episode five, Bran has a vision
where he experiences the creation of the Night King
by the Children of the Forest.
What we now know as the Night King
gets stabbed in the chest
by a dragonglass dagger.
It's under a similar-looking weirwood tree
that he would meet his demise,
again being pierced in the chest.
In season eight, episode one,
Arya sneaks up on Jon Snow in exactly the same place
where she kills the Night King.
He says:
How did you sneak up on me?
In season seven, episode four,
Bran gives Arya the dagger that he in turn
was given by Littlefinger.
The Littlefinger scene had seemed a
bit random at the time, and he turns it over
to her, saying:
I don't want it.
Ju: It's a testament to Isaac William Hempstead's
portrayal of Bran that without realizing
its significance, he has a wistful
and kind of knowing look on his face,
as if giving the dagger some significance.
Once Bran gives the dagger to Arya,
it's extremely visible on her belt
throughout the next episodes.
She then used it in a sparring
match with Brienne, using the same
drop move that she did with the Night King.
Characters die protecting Arya,
almost as if saving her life is the main objective:
Ser Beric Dondarrion and Syrio Forel.
Then we come to season eight, episode three itself.
The Hound has a seemingly distracting breakdown
during the episode, saying to Ser Beric:
We're fighting death. They can't beat death.
Ju: His reply is to point to Arya and say, "Tell her that."
Arya also repeats moves during the episode
that we've seen her do in previous fights.
Her first encounter with a wight mimics
her season-six training with the Faceless Men,
stopping the staff in the same position.
It should have been obvious that Arya was
being built up for something special.
Throughout the show, she has gone through
a lot of training.
It was never really clear what this training
would be for other than killing people on her list.
We now know that it was to save the
Seven Kingdoms from its most dangerous adversary.
Did you spot any other clues that we missed?
Comment below.