We can see the answer in what happens immediately after. It's textbook Ramsay manipulation, and it nearly worked. Ramsay was surrounded by loyalists to Jon's faction who immediately aimed at him. If ...

For everyone but Jon... ...it doesn't really matter what the rules would strictly say about Jon's status: Castle Black has just been, essentially, invaded by an army of wildlings and a giant. He's ...

He didn't. His original plan was for Tyrion to live - but Tyrion blew it after Shae's testimony. Remember this dialogue from S04E06 when a concerned Jaime is trying to reason with Tywin (adapted from ...

There's nothing remarkable about wanting to know where a dangerous, possibly vengeful city-destroying dragon with unclear motivations has gone - but it's worth asking why did King Bran immediately ...

More likely it's a reference to dysentery, which quite literally caused people to have "shat themselves to death" and was a huge problem not only in the real-life Middle Ages but also in books Game of ...

Congratulations! It looks like you spotted a subtle clue towards a plot twist originally planned to be revealed in season 2, that was later dropped. Pycelle was originally imagined by the showrunners ...

In this interview the actor who plays Ramsay (Iwan Rheon) refers to that line as meaning the lasting psychological damage that he's caused Sansa: I think [the final scene with Ramsay and Sansa] was ...

The simple answer is, they don't work well when winter is coming and people have been recently stockpiling food (like with the hopeless siege of Riverrun). Only commanders as incompetent as Frey & ...

Partly, it's miles away - not something southerners think about. He's far too cynical for solemn vows, and too much of an independent-minded loner to choose to huddle for warmth with hundreds of '...

The man with Jaqen's face actually explained this one pretty clearly (as seen in the transcript): The faces are for no one. You are still someone. And to someone, the faces are as good as poison. ...

No-one knew whether viewers would accept a "serious drama" about power politics with a fantasy setting. This article shows how much of the early criticism and rejection of the show (...

Möoz's answer is great, I just want to look at this one part in a little more detail: Trading a dragon for 8,000 soldiers is seen as an unwise trade; an experienced trader should see this as ...

I wrote a really long answer on this over on the other site... to summarise: Sansa doesn't want to rule. Littlefinger tried and failed to talk her into staking her claim in the previous episode, so ...

There are several clues that people in Braavos all know who the people of the many faced god are, and fear them (or at least, want to be thought well of by them): When Arya was in Braavos last season,...

I think there are three parts to this: 1. Why does he care about Jon and side with his friends at all? See Purpose of Davos protecting Jon Snow?. Basically, he's been thrust into siding with Jon's ...

I feel like this question would benefit from a spoiler-free overview, by character. The final section details which book characters don't appear in the TV show and visa versa, so stop reading before ...

Graham Lineham, sitcom writer behind several successful Irish and British sitcoms, wrote an article on this. This seems the most important point (my bold): Audience laughter, when it's deserved, ...

Just to add one thing about Theon which is explicit in the books and strongly implied in the show, which explains why it would be in character for him to act at that moment regardless of loyalties or ...

When Tyrion and Qyburn walked out to talk, they both stopped at a very specific point, further apart than was comfortable to talk. Then, when Tyrion walked a certain distance past this point, Cersei's ...

Since we're covering all the possibilities, there's one more that would tie up a lot of the in-universe questions (such as, why did the army of dead react so slowly?) and out-of-universe questions (...

I'd also wondered about this. I think it comes down to three things: He initially ended up with the Snow loyalists by chance. He didn't make a deliberate decision to go out of his way to side with ...

As a starting point, IMDB has a rather marvelous feature called "keywords" where users create tags for possible features of a film then tag films that contain such scenes or elements. It's a fun way ...

The short answer is, in the TV show, we absolutely don't know, and even in the books, it's mysterious. But there are a few small clues we can use to focus the possibilities. (this is based on the TV ...

Tautologist's answer gives evidence of possible moments of doubt - but there's also evidence he still believed Robert was his father until (at least almost) end. This is from the scene where the ...

If you don't like fairytales or the fluffy sillyness of some fantasy, and you like drama like Breaking Bad, probably you'll really enjoy Game of Thrones. It's all about a gritty, well-developed ...

An identical question was asked at the sci-fi site. I won't repost my answer completely, but to summarise, an alternate, much simpler theory based entirely on things that exist in real life is that ...

He had an incredibly simple world view and goal. He idolised Joe (see how excited he was when "He looked at me!!!" earlier in the chase. He knew he was dying, and wanted to go out in a glorious way (...

IvanaMNE's answer from the books reminded me that there was a similar scene in the TV show. Some quick searches in transcripts turns it up in season 3, episode 5, shortly after Jorah and Barristan met,...

Simplest answer is, he's in shock, head spinning, trying to make sense of what happened and his place in it. Don't forget that, despite not knowing Jon very well, Davos was with Stannis when he ...

Jon pretty much answers this question himself this very episode while talking to Sam. [I am] The first Lord Commander in history to sacrifice the lives of sworn brothers to save the lives of ...