This article contain coddler for " parentage of My Blood , " the sixth instalment of the sixth season ofGame of Thrones . Proceed with caution . You might also consider readingour full recapof the instalment .
Amid all of the relatively blanched events in " Blood of My Blood , " the return of Ned Stark ’s immature brother , Benjen , brook out – not only because he come in into the mix swing a bitchin ' flame ball - and - mountain range flail , but also because his long - look return resolve some dawdle geeky questions and leave us with a few more . So , as we labor into who ( and what ) , precisely , Benjen is , permit ’s first back up and answer the canonic question .
Back with a Benjen-ce: who is Benjen Stark again?
Benjen , the brother of Brandon and Eddard Stark , and the youngest son of noted Affleck - Garner marriage enthusiast Lord Rickard Stark of House Stark , join the Night ’s Watch for reasons thatGeorge R.R. Martin has yet to excuse , but probably had something to do with Ned inherit Winterfell after their Church Father and brother ’s last at the deal of Mad King Aerys Targaryen II and a realization that he would have been bore just being a nobleman and buying swords he was n’t ever going to habituate at the outlet memory in Crofter ’s Village .
We last saw Benjen , the First Ranger of the Night ’s Watch , in episode three of the time of year one , after he ’d welcome his large fan , Jon Snow , as a novel military recruit . Talking with his son of a bitch nephew on the Wall , Benjen state Jonthat he ’s going rank east of Craster ’s Keep in the Haunted Forest , which sounds like the correct place to go looking for undead thing . " There ’ve been disturbing reports , " says Benjen . " Reports I do n’t require to consider . "
Jon begs to go , too , on the grounds that he had just bunk up on a bunch of thieves and chubby people in training , but Benjen tell him that he has n’t earned anything , that his tomentum is n’t nearly luxurious or long enough , and that he has n’t even been killed by mutineer and beenbrought back to lifeby a reddish priestess yet . Then Benjen goes and bitches out quippy tourist Tyrion Lannister , and when Tyrion tells him that he thinks the only deviation between the crony of the Night ’s Watch and the wildlings is that when the Wall was build , the wildlings were on the wrong side of it , Benjen keep up the foreshadowing : " It ’s not the wildlings giving me sleepless nights . "
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Nor should they have been . Of course , Benjen go away , the rangers he was with are witness dead ( then turn to wights and have to be burned ) , his horse cavalry come back at some point with a look that ’s like , " Will someone please sell me to a nectarine orchard outside of Highgarden ? , " and then Benjen does n’t show up again until sequence six of the sixth time of year , when he ’s fire - thrashing every numb thing trying to kill Bran . But he is n’t exactly the same handsome - hairy uncle .
Introducing “Coldhands Benjen”
For as long as there have been Old Gods and New , people have speculated on the data superhighway about Benjen being a character from the book call Coldhands . Coldhands is a former commando who show up inA Storm of Swordsand rescues Sam and Gilly from Isle of Wight . In said books , he is the one who guides Bran , Meera , Hodor , and Jojen to the cave to suffer the Three - Eyed Raven . He also hinge on an elk .
His hand are moth-eaten because fellow is dead , and has opprobrious hands filled with jellied rakehell . Also deserving pointing out : he does not have those aphrodisiacal blasphemous optic that the White Walkers get when they ’re turned .
Now , in term of the books , the conjecture about Benjen being Coldhands was allegedly laid to quietus once a Texas A&M program library came into self-possession of an originalGoTmanuscript in which GRRM ’s editor in chief asks him point blank if Coldhands is Benjen , and Martin responds " No , " which is a moderately hard word to spin as " Yes . "
But , in this post - book world , as Kevin Garnett might bespeak out , anything is potential , and so the showrunners decided to tidy things up a bit and mix the two character reference . And in case you call up I ’m just telling a Littlefinger - manner truth , carbon monoxide gas - showrunner Dan Weiss even call him " Coldhands Benjen"in the after - show . SO THERE .
“You are the Three-Eyed Raven now”
Once Benjen practice his Mario - post - eating - a - flame - flower power to complete some wights and convince Meera that she and Bran should buck a ride with him ( literary argument nigher : " The dead do n’t repose " ) , he takes them to refuge and taste to make them feel welcome by chopping the head off a rabbit and squeeze its body above a cup to get blood . During this meter , he reveals himself to Bran , and you may see that the skin on his face has the same sort of weather damage the ranger deserter who first see a White Walker in the pilot had .
He talks about his tramp party and how a White Walker stabbed him in the gut with a sword of glass , and that the Children of the Forest found him and stopped the Walker ’s magic from taking hold by plunging a fragment of dragonglass into his heart . Then , for our purposes , he says several interesting thing .
One , he says that Bran is the Three - Eyed Raven now , and when his nephew protests by saying he does n’t lie with how to ensure his index , Benjen act like a life history four-in-hand , calmly telling him that he just has to control it " before the Night King comes . " And then he drops this : " One way or another , he will incur his way to the world of military personnel . And when he does , you will be there waiting for him . And you will be ready . "
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It’s going down, aka how the whole damn show will end
So , according to Benjen , there is going to be a final showdown between Bran and the Night ’s King at some tip , and it is in all probability move to take place at the Wall . Something to know about the Wall : it was allegedly built K of years ago by Bran the Builder ( who also happens to be the founder of House Stark ) using genuine normal labor to heap ice and stone , plus the additional bonus of magic from the Children of the Forest to keep the undead out .
That magic is apparently the same conjuring trick that kept the whole crew good in the Three - Eyed Raven ’s cave –untilBran gets marked ( Bran - ded ? ) by the Night ’s King in his badly - conceived solo vision . And that sucker could very well mean that Bran himself now is some sort of non - walking go repellent , and that if he attempts to pass through to the other side of the Wall , it could abruptly lose its magical facet and become just a giant rampart of ice . This could open up all of Westeros to attacks by the White Walkers . After all , winter is occur , dammit .
But if we attend at all of the things happening right now , we have some really sexy large - picture potential for an End of Days - type battle to end all battles . Here is my Nostradamus impression : Dany and her dragons will eventually cross the Narrow Sea with the Dothraki , the Second Sons , and the Unsullied ( and perhaps the Ironborn ! ) , and start laying waste across the South . The White Walkers will find their way past the Wall and do the same to the North . Eventually , once it becomes clear that the Night ’s King and the Walkers are n’t just there to watchhistorically inaccurate playsin Braavos , men will block up oppose among themselves and ordinate themselves in some sort of alinement , finally under Daenerys .
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As she is the young minor of King Aerys Targaryen II , aka the Mad King , aka he of “ burn them all ” celebrity , that saying could now have an significant new meaning when dragons are facing the White Walkers , two entities no one believed had existed for yard of year , ultimately squaring off . That will be our literal song of trash and fire , and when it pass , I will prompt you all and toot my own horn of wintertime .
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