We’ve learned things about the White Walkers in dribs and drabs over the course of the show. In season 4, we learned that they can turn human babies into members of their race. In season 5, we learned more about how they raise the dead. And in tonight’s episode of Game of Thrones — “Beyond the Wall” — we learned something important about how they can be defeated. Check out the video below.
The pertinent moment came when Jon Snow and his A-Team set a trap for a White Walker and his group of attendant wights. The A-Team ambushed the wights, and Jon, being the only one of them with a Valyrian steel sword, took out the White Walker. And when he did, most of the wights fell to the ground, unmoving.
What does this mean? That if you kill the White Walkers, the army of the dead will no longer be a problem. And who’s raised the most undead soldiers? The Night King himself, who brought back thousands after the Massacre at Hardhome. That makes Jon’s job pretty simple: kill the Night King, end the war. Although that’s obviously easier said than done.
Note that we’ve seen a couple of White Walkers killed before — Sam shanked one in season 3, Jon killed a White Walker general in season 5, and Meera stabbed one with a dragonglass spear in season 6. We didn’t see wights fall dead (well, deader) to the ground at any of those times, but in those cases, wights either weren’t in the immediate vicinity or their “deaths” were lost in the tumult of the events at hand.
How will our heroes use this information to their advantage going forward? Stay tuned.
Oh, and before that, Thoros of Myr was mauled by a zombie bear.
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