HBO
One of my favorite things to do is talk about Game of Thrones spoilers. Not so much the kind where I ruin things that are definitely going to happen in the show, mind you. I’m more into the speculation. Combining book knowledge, little clues and my own wild imagination to come up with a theory that could very well pan out. I’ve even parlayed that love into a co-hosting gig on the Storm of Spoilers podcast, on which I chat weekly with Dave Gonzales and Joanna Robinson.
The brilliance of Game of Thrones season 5 is that it has inspired some of our best theories to date. In this new weekly look at spoilers, I’d like to explain them for those of you who would like to dig deeper into the Game of Thrones hypotheticals than is considered healthy. With that in mind, you should know that what follows includes potential spoilers for the show. These theories are fueled by having read the books by George R.R. Martin, an unhealthy amount of time spent on the Wiki of Ice and Fire and plenty of wild speculation. Consider yourself warned.
If you choose to pass beyond Walter White Walker, Lord of Spoilers, you’ll be rewarded with my explanation of The Grey Wedding, the next nasty nuptials of Westeros.
We’ve mentioned The Grey Wedding several times on A Storm of Spoilers, mostly in a coy fashion until this week. In episode 3, “High Sparrow,” the path toward another wedding in The North has been set. We see Littlefinger and Sansa Stark standing outside Moat Cailin, talking about the wedding proposal mentioned in earlier episodes. It turns out that it wasn’t a proposal for Littlefinger, but a deal being struck between Littlefinger and Roose Bolton. Despite having been the orchestrator of the murder of her brother and mother, Sansa is going to align with Bolton (at least in outward appearance) and marry his son and heir Ramsay.
This is a large departure from the books, as it involves Sansa, but there is a wedding used by the Boltons to solidify their hold on The North. As we understand from the scene between Roose and Ramsay, the other houses of The North are not fans of being under the thumb of House Bolton. Having to peel the skin off of an entire family just to get them to pay their taxes is a bit much, even for Lord Roose. As a practical and strategic man, Roose knows that marriage is the only way to seal his hold on The North.
In the books the wedding that takes place is between Ramsay and Arya Stark, only it’s not really Arya Stark. The Bolton’s capitalize on the fact that Arya has not been seen since the death of her father and use Jeyne Poole, a former friend of Sansa, in her place. There’s also another grisly detail from the book, in which another northern lord named Wyman Manderly murders several Freys (remember them?) and cooks them into a pie that is served at the wedding of “Arya” and Ramsay. After a fracas breaks out between the Manderlys and Freys, Theon (now Reek) and fake Arya escape Winterfell and ultimately end up captives of Stannis Baratheon and his oncoming army.
How much of this will make it into the show?
There’s a lot of setup in just this episode that leads us to believe that some of this is going to make it into season five. The big change is that Sansa is the player on the Stark side of the equation. Theon is at Winterfell and has already begun to throw longing looks in Sansa’s direction. And there’s been talk from Littlefinger of “avenging” the deaths of Catelyn and Robb. So far as we can tell, he needs to get Sansa in the game and giving her the opportunity for revenge is a good motivator.
There is also a trail of breadcrumbs being left by the show’s cast. Sophie Turner had the following to say in December:
“There was one scene that I did do that was super, super traumatic and I love doing those scenes. It was just really kind of horrible for everyone to be on set, but those scenes are just kind of what feed me, that’s why I started out, to do all the crappy, horrible stuff.”
Alfie Allen has since added this about Theon’s perspective on horrible events in season 5:
“There’s something that happens about halfway through this season that is really going to make huge waves, and people aren’t going to be happy about it. It’s hard to watch.”
It all goes back to an article that my Storm of Spoilers co-host Joanna Robinson wrote in February about Sansa becoming a badass. Her theory at the time was that Sansa would be the ones to bake some Frey pies.
I now have a few alternative theories for what may happen with Sansa and Ramsay’s unholy matrimony, or more specifically this “horrible event” that the cast appears to be promising:
Option A: Sansa and Ramsay are wed, then Sansa pulls a Gone Girl in their wedding bed, killing Ramsay as vengeance for her brother, mother, sister-in-law and unborn nephew (among others).
Option B: Reek/Theon tries to warn Sansa about the fact that Ramsay is a monster, is caught by Ramsay and is tortured in a very public way as a show of Ramsay’s strength. The further humiliation and beating of Theon is not very savory for audiences, but since when has Game of Thrones been a show about righteous vengeance?
Option C: Brienne and Pod (still following Sansa and Littlefinger) sneak into Winterfell in an attempt to rescue Sansa. They break up the wedding and Brienne uses that very sharp sword to disembowel the groom. Okay, this one is wishful thinking, but it’s possible that Brienne and Pod will be involved.
Here’s what we know:
- There will be a wedding at Winterfell this season.
- “Something horrible” is going to happen and it involves at least Sansa, Ramsay and Theon.
- The reason why Sansa has agreed to this plan is that Littlefinger has offered her a shot at vengeance.
All of this leads me to believe that whether it involves Frey Pies, wedding night throat slashings, heroic go-for-broke rescue missions, public torture or even a good old fashioned poisoning, The Grey Wedding will be one of the more memorable events of season 5.
For more talk of this theory, give a listen to the last two episodes of A Storm of Spoilers, available below:
Episode 2: “The House of Black and White” (with some Grey Wedding discussion)
Episode 3: “High Sparrow” (with more Grey Wedding discussion)
I’ve got a feeling that we’ll be talking about this for at least a few more weeks.
Related Topics: Game of Thrones
