Inside HBO's Game of Thrones

by C. A. Taylor

  Green screen tests in Paint Hall Cell 4.

  During filming, we had a team of four ready to fix any immediate damage between takes, using blowtorches and a compound of wax and SFX powder snow to patch the wall. Overnight, for the whole three-week shoot, we had two teams who would start from the bottom and refinish the entire wall, so that each morning the climbers could start on a new fresh wall set. From start to finish, including all the tests for VFX, SFX, and stunts, the Wall remains one of the longest set builds on the show, taking about twelve weeks to complete.

  KIT HARINGTON (JON SNOW): It was a grueling shoot. They left you a little slack in the harness line, just enough so you really had to climb, and if you slipped, you would drop. At one point I was strapped to the Wall from behind and hauling Rose [Leslie, who plays the wildling Ygritte] up while facing forward, and it felt like you could fall all this way while you looked down. It wasn’t eight hundred feet, but it helped you imagine it. Of course, Rose did have to drop when the Wall gave way, and she was amazing. For the bigger stuff, the stunt people came in. What’s amazing is the way they watch your performance and mimic your style, how you move and climb and even how you use your axe. In the end, it was a wonderful dance to work with them.

  Tormund leads the climb.

  ROSE LESLIE (YGRITTE): You had to believe it. You wanted to see the strain in the face, the grip of the hand. As an actor, you want that depth in your performance. You could be hanging out in your harness for long periods of time, but just before filming, we turned over, and they would give you just enough slack so that you were on the Wall with your full weight. We had a wind machine from one side, and snow coming in from the other. For the four of us it was very real. You felt you were right on the Wall. Alik would remind us on each take of the threat of making a wrong move and what that could mean.

  JOE BAUER (VFX SUPERVISOR): An awful lot of care was given to the real set by the art department. The need to have four people climbing at once really dictated its size. We had two main sequences, one at two hundred feet and one at five hundred feet, which were mainly differentiated by the weather. At the lower altitude, it’s cloudy and the beginnings of a storm are brewing. But we also wanted to create a feeling of “Look how high we are”—as an audience, we have never been so high. By the time they reach the upper sequence, the characters are almost ripped off the Wall by the force of the storm.

  VFX extended and expanded the horizons, creating our own Wall of China, essentially. We started by fully scanning the actual set so we had a 3-D computer model to work from and could use that for tracking. The top of the Wall is very different, of course. It’s a tiny set in real life, and the actors had to bunch together. When they get there, it’s the first time we see that kind of view. We used two matte painters to create the view of what they had left behind and used that as a base. Then we used a photograph of a location in Southern Ireland to create the epic vista of the South—what they are moving toward. We lit it in a romantic light, since it’s a significant moment for Jon and Ygritte. It’s the moment they fall in love—we wanted the view to represent the possibilities that holds.

  Jon Snow and Ygritte reach the top alive.

  JOJEN REED

  “We’ve come a long way to find you, Brandon. And we have much farther to go.”

  —Jojen Reed

  Jojen Reed (Thomas Brodie-Sangster) first appeared as a mysterious boy in a dream of Bran’s when Bran was trying to track and kill the Three-Eyed Raven. When he was a small boy, Jojen was struck down by a fever that seemed as if it would take his life. His sister, Meera, nursed him for ten nights until the fever broke. When he awoke, he had the sight—but the visions take a toll on his still-fragile body in the form of violent seizures. Jojen has some knowledge of the warg, or someone who has the ability to enter and take control of an animal and make use of its senses. Jojen believes his visions are guiding him to take Bran north of the Wall to find the real Three-Eyed Raven that follows them both in their dreams.

  Jojen Reed played by Thomas Brodie-Sangster.

  THOMAS BRODIE-SANGSTER (JOJEN REED): I saw Jojen as someone different from everyone that Bran had ever met before. I like playing on the idea that at the beginning the audience had no idea if Jojen and Meera are good or bad. Jojen is so young and with such strong powers—he can be very intimidating.

  He’s grown up with the sight. It’s part of who he is. He is someone who sees it as a burden as much as a gift, but he is very accepting of it. He is, in fact, very accepting of everyone and the choices they make in life. He’s a very selfless character—he’s not driven by greed or power, but simply by his faith in his visions. In my mind, he is one of the most level-headed of all the people on the show because of it.

  MEERA REED

  “Some people will always need help. That doesn’t mean they aren’t worth helping.”

  —Meera Reed

  Howland Reed once saved Ned Stark’s life, and he was one of Ned’s closest allies and friends during Robert’s Rebellion. Now Howland’s children, Jojen and Meera, are bound by fate with Ned’s son Bran. Led to Bran by Jojen’s visions, Meera Reed (Ellie Kendrick) uses her skills to hunt for food and, above all, to protect her brother. When Meera first meets Bran’s protectress, Osha (Natalia Tena), she manages to get the upper hand on the woman, and they continue to struggle to find common ground. Eventually, when the group is forced to part ways, Osha must trust that Meera will work equally hard to protect Bran as well.

  Meera Reed played by Ellie Kendrick.

  ELLIE KENDRICK (MEERA REED): Their motivations are quite pure—for Meera, she just wants to protect her brother so he can follow his vision. They don’t care about power or politics. It’s about loyalty. I liked the fact their characters turn a cliché on its head—it’s a girl who does all the fighting to protect a boy. Meera is very level-headed. She’s open and honest. It’s a joy to play a strong woman who isn’t a bitch. There are so few. I knew the books and had always been drawn to the strong tomboy characters like Arya, so I was excited to get a chance to do stunts and learn skills.

  OSHA

  “I learned how to walk in darkness.”

  —Osha, on leaving Bran

  Osha (Natalia Tena) is a wildling woman from north of the Wall. She was once living with a man who disappeared. Though others in the village said he’d left her, she didn’t believe it. Sadly, she was proven right when, late one night, he did return—but as an undead wight, with unnaturally blue eyes the color of the sky. As the thing that was once her lover attacked, she plunged a knife deep into its heart, but it would not die again. After setting fire to her home with her undead husband inside, Osha ran and did not stop until she escaped south of the Wall, near Winterfell.

  There, she was caught trying to steal Bran Stark’s horse in the forests surrounding Winterfell, and she was taken back to the castle to serve as penance. Though she has become a devoted caretaker of the Stark children, she, more than anyone else, knows what’s arriving along with winter.

  After Theon Greyjoy betrays the Starks and captures Winterfell, Osha seduces Theon to help the two Stark boys, Bran and Rickon, escape, along with the powerful but dim-witted Hodor. Osha joins them in their flight, even though she is frightened of the black magic she thinks Bran’s visions represent. Ultimately, she refuses to continue with Bran, Jojen, and Meera on their journey north of the Wall. Osha swore she would never return there, and she instead chooses to protect little Rickon on a different path.

  Natalia Tena as Osha, the wildling woman.

  GEORGE R. R. MARTIN (CO-EXECUTIVE PRODUCER AND AUTHOR): Natalia, perhaps more than any other person playing a wildling has captured this sense of being half wild. She seems close to nature and only part civilized. In my view, she is mesmerizing to watch.

  NINA GOLD (CASTING DIRECTOR): There is only one way to put it really. When you meet Natalia, you realize she really is a wild thing.

  WARGING: A BRIEF HISTORY

  Jojen Reed:

  “You ca
n get inside his head and see through his eyes.”

  Bran Stark:

  “Only when I’m asleep.”

  Jojen Reed:

  “That’s how it begins. Until you learn how to control it. You’re a warg.”

  Bran (Isaac Hempstead-Wright) in the grips of a warging episode.

  though not well known south of the wall, the power to “warg,” or to take over the mind of an animal, is an accepted trait among the wildlings. Those with this gift are often used to scout on missions. A warg usually first experiences a transfer during dreams. When his mind is with an animal, the warg’s body remains in a vulnerable comatose state. During this experience, should the person’s body be killed, their consciousness can remain within the animal and survive. Conversely, if the host animal is killed, the warg will be deeply troubled but will also likely survive.

  Warging is not to be confused with the sight—a power to see both the past and the future in vivid dreams, guided by the Three-Eyed Raven.

  Bran Stark first experienced warging after he fell from a tower at Winterfell and became paralyzed. Bran, trapped in a crippled body, slowly manifested the ability to meld his mind in dreams with his direwolf, Summer. Bran’s joy while running as his direwolf became a temptation he found hard to resist.

  Bran’s skills, however, continue to grow in startling ways. For instance, after the escape from Winterfell, and after meeting Jojen and Meera Reed, their traveling party is threatened by wildlings. Desperate to protect everyone, Bran successfully enters Hodor’s mind and controls him, so that he can use Hodor’s physical strength, a terrifying indication of Bran’s natural ability.

  Animal trainers work with the wolves on green screen.

  — filming the direwolves —

  VFX data wranglers position the “stuffie” wolf for a take.

  * * *

  In season one, the five Stark children—Robb, Sansa, Bran, Arya, and Rickon—plus the bastard Jon Snow, each adopt a direwolf puppy after they find the orphaned litter in the forest near their dead mother. By the end of season three, two of the direwolves are dead, one is lost, and only three are known to be alive. Robb’s direwolf, Grey Wind, is killed by Bolton men at the Red Wedding. Sansa’s direwolf, Lady, is executed by her father, Ned. This occurs after Arya’s direwolf, Nymeria, bites the young prince Joffrey, and Arya drives Nymeria away for her own safety. So, to appease Joffrey, Ned kills Lady in Nymeria’s place. Thus, all that remain are Rickon’s Shaggydog, Bran’s Summer, and Jon Snow’s direwolf, Ghost.

  * * *

  STEVE KULLBACK (VFX PRODUCER): At the beginning of season two, we discussed how the wolves would be filmed. By then, we had some experience filming live animals, and that had not been pleasant.

  Everyone on the production and at the studio was keen on exploring the possibility of CG wolves. However, when we ultimately sat down with [executive producers and writers] David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss], we worked through what the direwolves were and what they needed to be—they were essentially just very large wolves. They didn’t need to speak languages; they didn’t need to perform judo or dance. And the best solution should solve the two most pressing needs: to get the most realistic and threatening possible creature that looks like a wolf and to have it be as least burdensome on production as possible.

  We proposed using actual wolves on a green-screen set—taking the animals away from production, and from the actors, as wolves remain dangerous even after training. The reality is, wolves can be trained to do only so much, and that has introduced a challenge in its own right, which the writers sometimes have to work around.

  JOE BAUER (VFX SUPERVISOR): The wolves are supposed to be 30 to 40 percent bigger than a standard wolf, so we had “stuffies” built to represent that. These are giant Game of Thrones–size dogs, which we carry to the set and shoot for reference and framing, so they leave enough room to accommodate the size of the wolf.

  The supervisor will often help the actors create the eye lines, using rigs to indicate the focus or movement. Sometimes it’s a stick with a piece of tape on it; sometimes it’s a tennis ball on a stick. Then, when we finally shoot the wolves on a green-screen stage, we scale everything down—like the height of the cameras and so on—30 percent from wherever the camera position was when filming the actors. We also shoot at a slightly faster frame rate—say, thirty frames per second rather than twenty-four frames per second—just to slow them down ever so much to accommodate their size, but not so much that they are moving in slow motion. Then we integrate or “marry in” the image of the wolf onto the shot, matching the light of the original day to keep it looking consistent.

  The CGI direwolf fully integrated into a scene with Jojen Reed.

  — return to craster’s keep —

  episode 304: “and now his watch is ended”

  Lord Commander Mormont (James Cosmo) leads the battered rangers back to the Wall.

  “And now his watch is ended.”

  —from traditional Night’s Watch eulogy

  * * *

  As they attempt to return to the Wall, the Night’s Watch arrives again at Craster’s Keep. They are weakened and conflicted, trying to both regroup after their encounter with the undead wights and prepare to meet what is following them. It is sometimes easy to forget the type of men who make up the Watch: hardened criminals, run-aways, and the exiled. Many men have survived, but they are angry, tired, and hungry. At the funeral pyre of one of the men, Craster is blamed for starving them.

  Later that night, Craster taunts the strained men and suggests they should just slit their throats and be done with it. Lord Commander Mormont loses control over the mutinous rabble and disaster strikes. Craster is killed by Karl, and Rast stabs Mormont in the back, felling the legendary commander. Brother fights against brother, and the Watch is divided between those loyal to Mormont and those in open rebellion.

  * * *

  The battle begins for control of Craster’s Keep.

  ALEX GRAVES (DIRECTOR): On my first night in Belfast, I arrived from L.A. and went straight to the director’s dinner. Within about one sentence David Benioff told me that the death of Mormont was probably half the reason they wanted to do the series. Here are these two guys who I want to impress, and I’m thinking, “Now you tell me.”

  I had all sorts of plans about how I wanted to do it. I wanted it to be at dusk, which is no problem when the days are generally overcast. We get there, and it’s the sunniest day they’d ever had at Craster’s. Every single shot is hiding sun.

  I looked at it like this: Someone is going to die. There’s about five minutes before it happens, and there’s a musical tempo to it, like a bolero. I was starting to worry about building tension, creating the feeling that something is wrong. It had a lot to do with where Mormont was, where Craster was, and all the guys coming in. You want the audience to ask why they are all there. I got obsessed with having everyone clocking where everyone else was. I wanted Grenn and Edd to be part of it because they are a big part of this story. I wanted there to be a feeling that something bad was coming and that it went beyond Craster’s death.

  KIT HARINGTON (JON SNOW): There is something that happens when a young man loses a father, which Jon does: first in Ned and then in Mormont. They take on their role. When Jon finds out that Mormont is dead, this man whom he really did love, he realizes he is sort of out of those father figures. There will be no more. I like to think that Mormont knew he was going to die and was trying to prepare Jon to be ready to pick up that baton.

  GILLY AND SAMWELL TARLY

  “I don’t have time for you. I don’t have time for anyone but him. because he doesn’t have much time.”

  —Gilly

  Gilly (Hannah Murray) is a young wildling woman and one of Craster’s daughters. In fact, Gilly is pregnant with her father’s child and terrified about her baby’s fate, particularly if it is a boy. While all the children of Craster face dark futures, the boys are under the greatest immediate threat. Soon after they are bor
n, they are taken to the woods and left for the White Walkers.

  The first time the Night’s Watch, under Mormont’s command, arrives at Craster’s Keep on their way north, Gilly appeals to Samwell Tarly (John Bradley) to take her with them when they leave, but Jon Snow will not allow it. When the Watch returns to Craster’s, after their defeat, Gilly gives birth to a boy. All she wants is to spend every moment she can with her baby, having lost faith that Sam can help her. However, in the chaos of the mutiny, when Craster and Mormont are killed, Sam takes the opportunity to run away with Gilly and her son, escaping into the forest with the echoes of the carnage following them into the trees.

  In the chaos of rebellion, Sam and Gilly escape into the forest.

  HANNAH MURRAY (GILLY): When it comes to the escape, she’s incredibly animalistic in her need to protect her baby. Her instinct to keep her child alive actually keeps her alive. I’m not sure if she had just chosen to run away and didn’t have her son that she would have made it.

  For Gilly, every experience or reference relates back to Craster’s. It’s all she knows, and you can never leave that sort of horror behind. It’s such a traumatic and strange world to grow up in. I think about how little she knows.