The Night King’s intimidating figure shall rule all by the end of “Game of Thrones.” | Fiona Legesse/The Cougar
Winter has arrived and is here to stay, as long as the Night King has anything to say about it.
For those of you who aren’t well-versed in “Game of Thrones,” the Night King and his army of White Walkers are the biggest threats to dismantling the Seven Kingdoms.
Today we will focus on why the Night King is the best character and tell you why he will reign supreme. Warning: Spoilers ahead.
Jorden, Opinion editor
The Night King is by far the coolest character in the entire show. Throughout every season, he has been one step ahead of every person who has come in contact with him.
He’s beaten Jon Snow and goaded him into making dumb mistakes. Not only did he mark Bran Stark, but he used that mark to kill the Three-Eyed Raven. Viserion —the Night King went full Summer Olympics and got himself a dragon.
And what about the last Children of the Forest, his creators? He took them out with ease. Their weak little fireballs knew nothing of the cold.
Needless to say, the Night King is easily the one person (Being? Entity? Creation?) who deserves to win.
The Night King is the only character on the show who remotely knows what he’s doing. His execution of doing what needs to be done is, in a word, impeccable.
The only time he’s suffered any kind of loss or setback is at Hardhome when Jon killed one of the other White Walkers. Even then, as we saw in the first season, there are other White Walkers in waiting. So what’s one loss?
It’s actually quite interesting. We’ve never really been given the White Walkers’ end goal. Maybe it destroys all humanity and creates a world where it’s winter forever, but we can’t be sure. Every other character has a clearly defined end goal. But with the Night King, we don’t know.
Even with that uncertainty, it’s pretty clear the path to the end goal is plotted well. Can you see the Night King making a grand mistake right now? Because I can’t. He is consistently the only character who has done a good job.
Jon has gotten very, very lucky — he was dead. Dany lucked out with the dragons. Cersei would be Queen of the Ashes if that meant she would stay Queen.
The Night King has a solid plan. And it shows.
Let’s be honest with ourselves here — does Westeros deserve to survive? There have been years of fighting, suffering and a lot of degeneracy. The Night King is like the Sweet Meteor O’Death: effective and, honestly, we deserve it.
Imagine a world where there’s no suffering, no war, no famine, only a dead ice man who controls your every moment. It’s surprisingly beautiful. It’s like an authoritarian regime but without the suffering because you and everyone you know is dead.
But seriously, the Night King is not human (anymore, thanks Children of the Forest). He does not have the empathy or emotions that weigh the other humans down. The reason Viserion died was because Jon did not realize it was a bad idea.
The Night King isn’t human. A huge advantage.
I personally cannot wait to see the Night King on the Iron Throne as snow falls around him and with Jon, Dany and Cersei all flanking him. This is the best scenario for all of Westeros and the world of “Game of Thrones.” Dany may be the temporary breaker of chains, but the Night King is the real breaker of chains; those chains being life.
I for one welcome the glorious reign of the Night King.
Tony, Assistant editor
I can’t name another antagonist whose goal is completely unknown. There’s the Joker in Christopher Nolan’s version of “Batman” who simply wanted to watch the world burn. But even he had plans: take over Gotham and watch the people of the city consume each other.
But the Night King has zero motivation that the audience is aware of.
All we know is he’s as cold as ice and holds one heck of a grudge. We also know he’s incredibly powerful and has an ice-breathing, undead dragon.
The Night King and his army of White Walkers are like the Patriots in the Brady-Belichick era or Nick Saban’s Alabama program: straight dominance.
You might be asking yourself, “What does the Night King and his army have anything to do with football?” Besides being completely dominant in their respective ventures, they both have very few weaknesses.
In order to kill a White Walker, you must either use Valyrian steel or dragon glass. Up until the last season, dragon glass was extremely rare. This is also the case for Valyrian steel, which is more of a prized family heirloom and uncommon among swordsmen.
This means regular steel has no effect on White Walkers. Seriously, if Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and Saban all had a love child, it would be the Night King. That’s how dominant of a force he has proven to be.
The “Game of Thrones” writers don’t care about your feelings (RIP Ned Stark). If anything, the show has taught us to never care too much about any character because no one is safe in the Seven Kingdoms.
Emilia Clark, who plays Dany, said she became depressed when learning about her character’s fate. A similar sentiment was shared by Gwendoline Christie — the actress playing Brienne of Tarth — who said the ending will cause the viewers to seek professional help.
The “saddest” possible ending would be the Night King taking complete control of Westeros and killing every last living soul. Well, sad to the weak. But we do not write for the faint of heart here in the opinion section.
The night is dark and full of terrors, and the Night King is coming for us all.
Opinion Editor Jorden Smith is a political science and creative writing senior, and Assistant Opinion Editor Anthony Cianciulli is a broadcast journalism senior. They can both be reached at [email protected].
