The Small Council: What longtime Game of Thrones character will die unexpectedly this season?

This post contains spoilers, speculation, and speculation that could amount to spoilers.

Over the past week, Entertainment Weekly rolled out extensive coverage on Game of Thrones. The coverage yielded plenty of stories, including one about an unidentified actor who had been with the show for a while, had read the books, and was surprised to learn that he or she was being bumped off early. Here’s the relevant quote:

As they say on reality shows, eventually a person’s “journal ends”—like it will this season for one cast member (we’ll just call them “an actor”) who has been with the show for several years. In their trailer, Northern Ireland’s seemingly endless rain patters on the roof as this person puts a good face on their situation. They just shot their final Thrones scene. Their death will be as surprising to fans as it was to them.

“It proves you should probably not read the books,” the actor says. “I thought this season I was going to have more to do, and I was really looking forward to that. And then I got my dates from my agent and I thought, ‘That doesn’t tally.’ Because there was no way if they were sticking to the books I should be in it for that number of weeks. It seemed to me they must be writing me out. The showrunners rang me and told me, ‘Your time is up in the series.’ I’m disappointed but you have to accept that the demands of TV are different. I find myself being quite emotional about it. I’m going to miss it. Never mind being a professional, they’re very nice people.”

This week, the Small Council will consider which character might be getting the boot, what it might mean for the series, and generally ruminate on the ever-expanding gap between the show and the books. So basically, we’ll speculate wildly.

BEGIN SPOILERS…NOW!

Dan: The producers of Game of Thrones threw down the gauntlet last year when they killed off Jojen Reed in “The Children.” Jojen hadn’t died at this point in the story as told in the books, and his demise announced yet another way the show was willing to depart from the original text. Characters, even important(ish) characters like Jojen, could now be killed onscreen even if they hadn’t died on the page, which took away the security blanket cherished by many book-readers.

Having seen that play out, it wasn’t too surprising to learn that more characters who hadn’t yet died in the books would die on the show during the coming season. Determining just who will die is a trickier matter. I love the trail of clues the above interview leaves us. The mystery actor filmed his or her scenes in Northern Ireland (where the producers film, among other things, scenes at Castle Black and Meereen). They have a trailer, they’ve read the books, and they say things like “That doesn’t tally,” which is an idiom I’ve never heard before. Is it English? Irish? Does anybody know?

Anyway, the good nature with which the actor accepts their fate makes me think it’s someone older. After “tallying” through a list of applicable performers in my head, my guess is that it’s Ian McElhinney, the man behind Barristan “the Bold” Selmy.

It would fit. Barristan has a big role in A Dance with Dragons, so McElhinney would have been surprised to learn that his character was being killed off. If my guess is right, the producers could be thinking of maneuvering Jorah into the role, following his inevitable reconciliation with Daenerys. It would be unfortunate, since McElhinney has been a rock-solid performer. Also, Selmy is a fascinating character, and one of the few people in Westeros who was around to experience the country’s rich history.

Honestly, I hope I’m wrong about this. Who do you guys think might be getting the axe, and what might it mean for the show?

Ani: Dan, “It doesn’t tally” is totes a Brit expression, which isn’t all that surprising, as that only narrows it down to 98% of the cast.

Let’s look at the details, do our best Benedict Cumberbatch, have a few random words fly all around our heads and notice the following: the person has “been with the show for several years.” This is important, because they don’t actually say “since Season 1.” The truth is, very few of the cast from the first season had read the books, and most didn’t attempt it, partly because they didn’t know if the show would be a hit, and partly because they wanted their character’s arc to be organic to the television production. I believe Kit Harington and John Bradley are the exceptions to that rule. It wasn’t until Season 2 that actors who happened to be book superfans started lobbying to get on the show, like Gwendoline Christie. In fact the only ones off the top of my head from Season 1 who I know said they’ve read the books are Alfie Allen (Theon) and Aiden Gillan (Littlefinger.) I know some say they’ve read their own chapters though, like Sophie Turner and Emilia Clarke.

But from that list I think the best suspects are in fact Theon, Aiden and Brienne. Theon’s arc is the only one that still seems to be semi-following the books, but with the suggestion that Ramsey Bolton may march on Stannis, there’s always room for death in battle. Brienne’s entire Book 4 arc was dispensed with in a single scene in the middle of episode 8 last season. What has she left to do, other than wander in circles around the Reach? Perhaps she’ll die from grief from lack of Stoneheart. Meanwhile, Aiden Gillan now exists in a parallel universe to the book story, one where Sansa turned right and revealed who she was to the Lords Declarant instead of left, where she continued to pretend to be Alayne Stone. We cannot know where his story is going, we can only suspect that whatever happens with him will somehow relate to Sansa’s “six on the Game of Thrones tragedy scale.”

Of the three, I don’t believe Littlefinger will die, simply because he’s been far too smart a puppet master to let that happen. Theon and Brienne though? Let’s hope their agents have fallback positions lined up.

David: While both my colleague’s arguments are sound, there can be only one death that will shake the entire Game of Thrones fanbase to its core. And that death is, Samwell Tarley.

Let’s look at the facts, shall we? We know that Jon is going to Hardhome this season, which means that he won’t be sending other men of the Night’s Watch. Whether he will become the 998th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch before that has set to be seen.

In the books, Jon sends Sam and Gilly, along with Mance’s baby, to escort Maester Aemon to Oldtown. The other reason he did this was to get Mance’s baby away from Melisandre, who wanted to sacrifice the tyke because of his royal blood. In the show, there is a completely different story to deal with. Mance doesn’t have a baby…in fact, the only baby at the Wall is Gilly’s child.

Sam also has aspirations of becoming a Maester, but that hasn’t been touched on in the show. Sam has been Jon’s right hand man since Jon returned from his stint as a fake wildling. How better to shock and awe Game of Thrones fans than by killing the most lovable and adored character on the show…besides Ser Pounce, of course.

John Bradley has stated that this season will see Sam deal with his growing relationship with Gilly, and that Stannis and he may not see eye to eye. My theory is that in some sad and tragic way, Sam will be killed. Whether it’s by fire and Melisandre or some sort of betrayal at the Wall, I just don’t think everyone’s favorite aspiring wizard will make it out of Season 5 alive.

• Published on 03/20/2015 at 12:19 PM CDT
• Last updated on 10/21/2016 at 1:06 PM CDT