Arya Stark is one of the most beloved "Game of Thrones" characters, and one of the few
to survive all eight seasons.
The youngest Stark daughter has seen more than her fair share of troubleSs, and audiences
were witness to her cleverness and strength of will during each adversity.
She was held captive twice, received tortuous training at the House of Black and White,
and eventually proved her mettle by running through most of the names on her infamous
Kill List.
To many fans, it may seem that Arya can do no wrong — but one would be remiss to say
that she didn't commit a few sins along the way.
The character had a tendency to let her emotions control her actions, as evidenced by her betrayal
in the House of Black and White, or when she left the Hound to die in agony.
Yet there is, perhaps, one moment that stands out above the rest of Arya's transgressions
— one that showed a side of Arya that left fans with a bitter taste in their mouths.
In Season 7, Episode 5 of "Game of Thrones'' — "Eastwatch" — Arya becomes suspicious
of her sister, Sansa, who appears to be enjoying her authority a bit too much while Jon Snow
is away from Winterfell.
Of course, Sansa denies Arya's accusations that she means to betray their brother, but
when Arya finds the old letter that Sansa wrote while being held hostage by the Lannisters,
it seems to cement the younger Stark sister's doubts.
In the very next episode, "Beyond the Wall," Sansa sneaks into Arya's room, where she is
shocked to find Arya's collection of faces.
Arya catches her in the act, and gives her a bone-chilling, not-so-veiled threat.
When Sansa questions Arya about the faces, Arya tells her,
"With the faces, I can choose.
I can become someone else — speak in their voice, live in their skin."
Arya then takes a knife from a table and stalks closer to Sansa, as she wonders out loud what
it might be like to wear Sansa's face.
Arya then calmly hands Sansa the knife and walks out of the room, leaving Sansa trembling
in fear.
While it's true that the sisters may not have gotten along well in the past, the idea of
Arya threatening Sansa's life is just unsettling, not to mention out of character.
After all, there are so few members of the Stark family left, and it would be detrimental
to their cause if they were to start turning on each other.
Luckily, Sansa and Arya catch on to Lord Baelish's scheme to tear them apart, and conduct a scheme
of their own.
Still, Arya definitely had us worried for a minute.
When you consider the journey Arya goes through during the entire story of "Game of Thrones,"
it's easy to understand how she could make a mistake every now and then... especially
when it comes to trusting people.
The tomboy of the highborn, Northern Stark family, Arya wants nothing more than to learn
to fight and become powerful in her own right, though her father Ned still holds out hope
that she'll grow up to marry a great lord and mother plenty of heirs.
Though Arya and Sansa's sisterly squabbles take up most of the show's first season, the
two are the only witnesses from the family when Ned is beheaded in King's Landing, and
years of separation ultimately serve their relationship.
Without her family, Arya goes through a lot, to put it mildly, constantly escaping captivity
and near-death situations thanks to her quick instincts, with very few allies to speak of
— which probably contributes to her trust issues.
Eventually, she befriends the mysterious Jaqen H'ghar, who leads her to Braavos to teach
her the ways of the Faceless Men.
But Arya can't quite follow the Faceless Men's seemingly endless sets of rules, and uses
her newfound face-shifting abilities to seek revenge on enemies.
However, it's hard not to root for Arya even as she shirks the tenets of the Faceless Men;
the people she decimates are typically purely evil, like the Stark-murdering Walder Frey,
making her vengeance feel pretty righteous in the end.
Finally, by Season 8 of the show, Arya seems to have reached her final form.
She uses her fighting skills to destroy The Night King and save the entire world, survives
the final struggle for the Iron Throne, and then blazes her own trail by setting off to
find what's west of Westeros.
In the end, Arya Stark is what she always dreamed of being: A powerful, independent
woman who gets to make her own way in the world, wherever it might lead her.
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