With Game of Thrones beginning a shortened and faster-paced penultimate season this Sunday, expectations are high.
Characters are coming together and storylines are paying off as the show is now almost completely beyond the books.
While there may be an extra long wait for the final season, there is rampant speculation as to how this series will end and if popular theories will prove true.
Last season had lots of fan service as many long-held questions were finally answered.
Jon Snow lives! Benjen is Coldhands! R+L does in fact =J!
With such a sprawling story and a world full of characters, there are still many questions that need answering.
No doubt the most important reveals will be saved for the final season. Hey, we may even get The Winds of Winter before then (don’t hold your breath)!
Listing all of the remaining questions would likely fill a tome the size of the novels.
No doubt there are plenty I have left out. But based on the trailers, online speculation and the past events of the show and books, here are the 10 biggest questions heading into Game of Thrones Season 7.
***Spoilers and speculation for all of Game of Thrones, books and show, to follow***
1 Who will Arya kill on her revenge tour?
Arya finally made her way back to Westeros at the end of last season.
She quickly made her mark in one of the most crowd-pleasing moments of the entire series by killing Walder Frey.
Now that she is back, will Arya target the remaining names on her list?
Cersei may be a lofty goal but she still owes Melisandre for taking away someone we may see again.
Whether Arya can avenge her family and friends and not lose herself in the process will be interesting to watch.
2 Will Jamie kill Cersei?
Jamie has lived with the moniker of ‘Kingslayer’ for most of his life for breaking a sacred oath and killing the Mad King.
We know he made the moral choice there, but the Aerys II was just his king, Cersei is his queen, his sister and his lover.
Will he be able to stand idly by as she slips into madness and puts the entire realm at risk?
3 Is Euron the show’s next great villain?
As a book reader, I know I am not alone in being highly disappointed in the portrayal of Euron Greyjoy up to this point (No eyepatch? Seriously?).
A character that was insane and brilliant, captivating and terrifying in the books has come off as a goofy caricature.
That said there is still hope that he can be the villain he was meant to be.
Will he join forces with Cersei? Is he the greatest threat to Dany and will Dragonbinder come into play?
4 Will Sansa turn on Jon?
Sansa and Jon have made a huge difference in the larger game by retaking Winterfell.
But with Littlefinger in Sansa’s ear about Jon’s illegitimacy and her being the rightful heir to the North, will she turn on Jon?
Sansa has come into her own but Littlefinger may convince her that going against Jon is for the greater good.
Littlefinger plays this game better than anyone and his moves are hard to read, sometimes imperceptible and full of misdirects and ambiguity.
5 Will we finally get Cleganebowl?
One of the internet’s most meme’d Game of Thrones topics is again a possibility.
With Sandor Clegane alive and well and the Mountain alive-ish, the two may finally settle a feud that dates back to childhood.
It looks like the Hound and the Brotherhood may venture North so how this bout would come about is anyone’s guess.
But so long as they are both alive there’s a chance. Get hype!
6 What role will Bran play in the wider story?
Bran’s story has always had the most fantasy elements of any character’s while also being the most separate from the wider intermingled stories of the other characters.
That said, it seems as though he will play a crucial role in the great war with the Night King. The question is how?
Will Bran use his greenseeing to discover how to defeat the walkers? Will he reveal the truth about Jon’s parentage? What historical secrets might he uncover?
7 What will Sam discover at the Citadel?
Samwell has been sent to the capital of knowledge in the Seven Kingdoms to become a maester.
There he hopes to discover whatever ancient knowledge he can to aid in the war with the White Walkers and the army of the dead.
What will he discover there? Is there more going on than meets the eye and is Sam’s role more important than we realize?
8 How will Jon prepare for the great war?
It doesn’t seem like Jon will be sitting idly by ruling as King in the North from the comfort of Winterfell.
The second trailer for this season seems to show Jon and perhaps the Brotherhood without Banners on some sort of mission beyond the wall.
With the army of the dead coming south why would Jon go towards the coming storm?
What could be so important to risk what is ostensibly a suicide mission?
Are they on an assassination mission to bring down the Night King, or are they after the legendary horn of winter or is it something else entirely?
9 Will the wall come down?
The wall is the literal shield that guards the realms of men. On the Northern side of that wall, winter is coming.
The Night King will eventually lead his army to the wall. For the great war to truly start they must get south of it.
Do the White Walkers have the Horn of Joramun? Will the season end with the wall coming down? Only time will tell.
10 What is Daenerys’ next move?
This is a very broad question but we know that she has returned to Westeros and based on the trailers has taken up seat in her ancestral home on Dragonstone.
But what alliances does she make? How does she announce her return to the realm?
Will she meet with Queen Cersei for a bit of verbal sparring and thinly veiled threats? Or will she go straight to war?
With increasingly massive dragons and an army at her back, hers will be one of the most exciting stories this season.
Game of Thrones Season 7 premieres Sunday 7/16 at 9/8c on HBO.