All language subtitles for Game.of.Thrones.S00E49.The.Game.Revealed.The.Long.Night.AMZN.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-NTG

Episode three was... Oh, my God.

As a fan I thought, "Wow."
As a DP, I thought, "Fuck."

If you take Hardhome

and you take Bob,
and to take the lake,

and you add them together,
add a five-by-four,

you have episode three.

We had 11 weeks of night shooting,

so that was quite a feat
for any crew to go through.

We knew this episode
was gonna be almost entirely battle.

It's well over an hour
and it's mostly action.

And part of what we cared
about a lot here

was getting Miguel on board

and forcing him to shoot
55 straight nights.

I never ever want to do that again.

I don't think anybody who did
that ever wants to do it again.

Yeah, that was tough.

And I don't think
it was something

that anybody really realized
just how hard it was gonna be.

"The Long Night."

When I was doing it,
it was minus 14.

Just chilling. Minus 14.

In a field.

You know, it's too cold to snow.

When it's too cold to snow,
you know you got trouble.

Chris and the rest of
the team, they were there day in, day out.

We would start your evening
at six o'clock at night,

and then you'd go home
at five o'clock in the morning

and it just... That's brutal.

Your body never acclimates
to that 100 percent.

By, like, week three, they...

people looked
slightly haunted.

The cast, stunts,
background, crew,

everybody just looked like,
this is...

This is, like, getting into us.

This is, like,
getting into our spirits.

I... I'm not gonna lie, it was horrible.

We enjoyed the work
and I said to my guys,

"You know, you might not
want to do it again,

but you won't regret
doing it the first time,

because the product,
what you've achieved, is amazing."

I think the crew,
they enjoyed the...

The result is, you know,
you didn't do all this and think,

"That's not really impressive."
There's no doubt about it.

It's really
an impressive sequence.

And I think the nights are just one of
the things we're gonna get through this.

It's just another notch
in the belt

of the crew on Game of Thrones that they'd
done things that feel quite unique.

I'm proud of everyone.

I'm proud of the work
that was put in.

I think it was a mammoth task
that we were faced with.

And we did it,
and it just feels incredible.

That first week
after night shoots,

seeing the crew, like,
smiling at the sun.

What they went through
was pretty stunning,

and, look, it's not...
You know,

there's no special prize for being the
toughest crew, but there probably should be.

Working in the pitch
dark in the rain, in the mud,

it's a real testament
to the entire Belfast crew,

who... gave us something that no
amount of money could ever buy.

The task that we had, which was
the primary task on three,

was how do we keep this
interesting?

'Cause simply,
battle fatigue, you know.

You just get bored,
you get exhausted.

We really wanted to make sure
we were telling

a coherent story with the whole
thing and not just having...

battle-beat, battle-beat,
battle-beat.

There needs to be a shape to it
and a propulsion to it.

It became clear when we started planning it,

that the battle was gonna be
a series of concentric circles.

It would be
walls of defenses failing,

and the dead getting closer
and closer to the center,

into the heart of Winterfell
and taking over everything.

The way that I concepted
episode three visually,

was to create a color scheme that
developed throughout the whole episode.

So, it starts with
a moonlit night...

because the Night King brings
the storm and the clouds.

The moon becomes dissipated
and the moonlight takes over,

but in a very diffused
kind of way.

And then the next stage would be
the trench going up.

We wanted the trench to be
this overpowering light.

And in prep for a long time,
Miguel always mentioned hell to me.

It's turning into Hell
for each character.

So the blood-red fire of the
trench takes over the image and...

completely drains out the blue
of the moon until the end,

because the trench
is dying down.

The moonlight suddenly
gets introduced again.

So that was kind of the way
for me to...

To break it up into sections.

So,
you have something that's visually different,

so it's refreshing
in that respect.

But how do we take it
one step further?

So, what we decided was to
give each act a genre.

So,
basically Act I is suspense and it's buildup.

And the best way to do
buildup is...

In any sort of
kinda monster movie,

which is what this is,
is to not see the monster.

Act II is actually,

from the moment that Arya
is on the back foot

and enters into the castle,
that's the horror movie.

And then Act III
is an action movie.

And so,
by breaking it into genres,

it allowed us to change rhythm
and go off on tangents

when we followed
specific characters

for a longer period of time
rather than worried about

what was happening
to everyone else.

The core of it is the people you care about.

You wanna care about
the people fighting,

so every effort is made
to make sure that

you center that conflicts
around the people you know.

So, whether
it's Arya's storyline,

or Sansa and Tyrion
down in the crypt,

or Jon Snow and Dany
up on the dragons,

it's kinda like all these separate little
battles within the greater battle.

Light the trench!
Light the trench!

Ah, fuck!

Sorry, I'm really sorry.

The living do have some
time to prepare for this battle.

And one of the things they know
going into it

is that they're gonna be
outnumbered,

and another thing they know

is that the wights
don't like fire.

So, they dig a massive trench around the
entire castle, and fill it with kindling.

To read the word "trench"
on the page doesn't sound like anything,

but it took such a lot of work
to try and resolve it to a point

that it was a convincing method
of defense.

It was important
that this trench

not be something that anybody
could jump over.

So, we needed to construct
these bridges

that would then collapse
and create another barrier.

The trench had
real wooden spikes,

real wooden logs lining
throughout the trench.

Then the real logs were replaced
by steel logs

that could burn
over a number of weeks

without burning away.

We had to accommodate
a whole special effects rig.

So, the considerations
are enormous.

Then, yeah, the trench
sort of encompasses...

pretty much the whole
of the castle.

As trenches go, it was a good trench.

And I've done some trenches.

Light the trenches!

And then the reality
of how do we light a...

nine-hundred foot-long thing
full of bitumen,

with hundreds of people
running at it

and stunt people in it.

Oh, I mean...

So...

The complicated process
of the trenches began

with the concept of it
being a first line of defense.

Therefore, it had to be impressive,
it had to be very big.

So, we had to devise a way
we could produce a flame

which is big enough
for the outside environment.

So we came up with a system,

which is just a simple
water trough.

It makes the most economical
flame out of propane.

And then, of course, you've got to
think about the consumable part of it.

You can't have real logs in there,
it has to be a steel thing.

It has to be able to endure
the heat and the fire.

I think we did 900 steel logs,
and we did 16 steel troughs.

And then you have to work out how you
get that amount of gas to each trough.

We've got one four-ton tanker
with a mobile unit,

which is five ton.

So, with the combination
of the two,

we convert liquid
into the gas,

and that's what gives us
our gas of life.

We run it off an electronic

valve system that's
tied in with a firing box.

And each one is ignited by an
individual gas bank in a sequence.

It uses a lot of gas.
A lot of gas.

- Got your gas bill yet?
- Haven't got my gas bill. Dreading that one.

When you see the Red Priestess
come out and light that trench,

that that would be such an
extraordinary moment,

as it just...
...lights around Winterfell.

In terms of imagery, I always thought
that was such a fantastic thing.

So, you really were seeing for the
first time the ice and fire meeting.

So, that was something that I thought
was a really lovely image to establish.

I got a call from Miguel,
like, a year before we started shooting.

Basically, he was like,
"I can't tell you anything

but get your endurance up now,
I want you to be training.

You have a lot to do.
It's gonna be night shoots.

We're gonna do three months
of night shoots."

And I was just like, "Okay!"

Like, I think I was in Boston
at the time,

like, eating cheese fries,
like, "Cool!"

Her entire fight through
the battlements

was just a real great moment,

and everything that I have learned
really did come down to that

and I did use every sort of skill
that I'd learned in that fight.

It's one thing to go on the battlements,

but then over the top
of Winterfell,

you've got these two staircases that go
up to the middle section of castellation.

So, we thought it would be
really claustrophobic

and dark and scary to be
in there with wights,

but that's when the full staff
doesn't really work.

We all know these tunnels
are very small

and the last thing you want
is a five-and-a-half

or a six-foot quarter staff going
through small, little alleyways.

So, what I decided to do
on this one,

be able to cut it in half
so it'd be able to disassemble

within the fight sequence,
and then have two,

so she could use both in each hand.

Which is great, and it gave
Arya then the stunts,

something else to play with
and to train with.

Yeah, 'cause if I concentrate
on doing the move,

one of them does it,
and then the other one doesn't.

And it's like...

One of the incredible things about
Maisie is that she's a righty.

Because Arya in the books
is left-handed,

she decided she was gonna learn
how to fight left-handed.

So, in season one,
when she's training with Syrio Forel,

she's training
with her left hand

and it was incredibly challenging,
but what it does mean was that

she's learned how to fight left-handed
and she's actually right-handed,

so she's become
an ambidextrous fighter.

Maisie does almost
all of this stuff on her own.

She has an excellent stuntwoman
for the dangerous stuff,

but most of it is actually
Maisie.

Her coordination and she's really quick.

You know, can make changes
on the spot and it actually...

She's really easy to work with.

It's one thing practicing
a fight,

which is like a spar,
a sparring fight, you know.

But then when you're actually
fighting for your life...

...with loads of stuntmen
who, like, do this day-to-day

and are not scared of anything,
and they're covered in this crazy makeup

and they're coming at you
like...

It's just a completely
different ballgame.

And I think I probably hold the
record for the most apologies on set.

Fucking hell! I'm so sorry.

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!
Fuck! Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!

Sorry, guys!

They're fine,
they got pads on.

We knew any situation where
lots of people are fighting,

Arya needs to play
a central role

'cause she's
one of the best at it.

That's amazing,
and it's a lot of fun to watch,

but it's also... It's one note
and to try to play that note

through the whole episode, it wouldn't
have worked. So, having her wounded,

and having her almost taken out
of commission

and almost rewinding the clock on who Arya
Stark is, would really be interesting.

It would also give us a chance to change up
the nature of the story we were telling.

The library sequence was

I need to have a marked shift,

where the audience, instead
of coming back and going,

"And more battle,"
they come back and they go, "Oh.

Change in style."

Hopefully, what it does is it refreshes
the audience, and they're like, you know,

"We wanna know what's going on
outside, but we're okay

to be inside for a minute
and slow things down.

And we're also okay to be
with Arya," who's suddenly,

from being this incredibly
confident character

that she's been now
for quite some time,

is completely traumatized
by what's happened to her.

One of the things we did
when we shot that sequence is

we designed the library in a certain way,
and then I took Maisie in there,

and I got nine wights
or something in there,

and I gave them all a path
and then I told her

she had to make her way
through it without being seen.

And we figured out
this whole choreographed piece

where everything was a near miss and
everything was just about not seeing her,

and everything had to be silent.

And it was really fun to do.

Oh, my God, that was so scary.

So the hero wights
in the library.

Miguel, he was after somebody
who could get themselves

into quite
an interesting position,

but have the physique which
would be a little bit unworldly,

which would suggest
they're dead basically.

I knew of this performer,
Spanish performer,

called Javier Botet,

and he's double, triple jointed. He can do
the most ridiculous things with his body,

and he's been covered
in prosthetics

pretty much all his career,
so I knew he was the guy

that could pretty much sell it
for us.

And from a prosthetics
point of view,

he's got a couple of little bits
and pieces.

He's got some little cheek bone
appliances.

We got a few little scrapes
and wounds, and then we just did

this sort of airbrushed
body painting on him as well,

and just really accentuated
all his sort of shadows

and all his muscles
and his bone structure

and his movement just sold it
for us.

We're all in love
with Lyanna Mormont.

I think the whole world is,
so we wanted this to be

her absolute heroic moment.

Oh,
when I found out I was dying,

it was, like,
it was the best thing, really.

It sounds strange,
but I either decided I'd be happy

if I ended up on the throne,
which I thought was very, very unlikely,

or I had a great death,
so I'm very happy.

And the whole giant thing,
that's just really cool.

Bang.

All the shots
with Lyanna and Krum...

were all really
pretty complicated,

and they all had lots of pieces
to them.

So, it started out at tomb,
where we shot the Winterfell set,

and we shot a lot of
the backgrounds for the shots,

and where we wanted to frame
for the giant,

we used this technology
called INCAM,

and this allowed us to playback
sort of an animation

of what the giant's performance would
be that was synced to the camera.

And so that when Sean Savage,
who's the A camera operator,

is operating on the day,
he can actually see the giant

at its proper scale in the set.

So, they were able to operate it
as if it was a real thing.

We got it.

Yeah, that better, boys.
Let's move that out.

The giant is real.
He could be 3D,

but we prefer to shoot real, organic
live photograph people wherever we can.

Our giant performer, Ian White,

who's seven-foot five,
I believe,

he performed all the actions
of the giant

in front of green screen,
but we shot him in a way

to double his scale.

For the shots where he had
to pick up Lyanna,

we put tracking markers on
a green doll that he picked up,

and we motion captured that
and would use it to drive

a robotic arm, basically,
to pick up our actress, Bella,

and that would move her around
as if she's being held by Krum.

You know,
for some of those shots,

there's at least four or five
elements that we photographed

at different times that will all
go into making that final shot.

Really, it's just bringing
the lowest techs,

miniature props approach,
and the very highest tech,

digital scaling
and digital handoffs.

Yeah, I think it's
very fitting for Lyanna to die,

like, doing something like that,
stabbing a giant in the eye.

It's a bit like...
I realized today,

it's a bit
like David and Goliath.

The same sort of thing...
that just a stab in eye kills him.

With this little Lyanna Mormont.

Down in the crypt
becomes just a complete horror movie.

It's terrifying down there.
We're in a crypt.

Nobody thought of that.

He's bringing all
the dead people back to life.

And they've put women
and children in a crypt

with all the dead people,
so...

Tyrion is smart,
but I guess not that smart.

Yeah, the whole
action was really fun,

'cause I never get to do
any action.

In between setups, Peter and I
would be joking around,

like, with our guns, like,

running between podium to podium
trying to catch a wight.

We felt like action stars,
even though

we're probably
around, like, five meters.

With the wights in the crypt,
for us, that was exciting,

'cause we realized we could do
some really cool mummified,

and dried husky sort of,
um, wights.

We referenced ancient mummies.
We looked at corpses

and there are some tombs which
have got these figures which are

exactly the inspiration
we were looking for

and they're these dried,
wizened bodies

which still have dried
encrusted skin all over them.

They still have hair, and they're
hundreds and hundreds of years old.

They have their teeth.
Really, really dusty,

and completely different
to what we'd seen before.

There was one point
where I had to, like,

run through a crowd of people,
and wights were coming out,

and one came up to me,
and I actually started crying,

I was so scared, like...

Whenever I get scared,
I just cry and it was so awful.

Those wights are horrible.
Just as scary in real life. I hate them.

They're around
dark corners, and you're like...

You don't fully know
where they're all coming from.

I mean, everything's safe
and mapped out,

but it's still...
You get into it.

And you're just going
by candlelight,

we don't have any other lighting
sources down there, really.

It's creepy. It was fun.

A week underground
with dead people.

Think we're such nice people,
but, you know, we...

It's just such violence
that we're portraying,

and, uh, I've often said,
"How did we end up here?"

I think the lesson
that we learned

on Battle of the Bastards
was just how difficult it is

to work with dead bodies,
to work with these prop bodies.

How expensive it is,

how difficult they are
to move around...

so Rob Cameron and Gavin Jones,
our prop maker, came up

with the idea of molding
these bodies into these disks.

The brief was to try and create
a lightweight version of bodies

as a sort of relief.

We would get eight or nine
dummies dressed in their armor,

and then we would make
a huge mold of that.

So, our mold could capture
all of the detail,

the limbs and the fabric
and the armor.

We had, I think,
probably about 300 body piles,

which we would've painted
up in different elements,

you know, give them some skin tone,
give them a bit of a palette,

and individually pull out
each body.

And the good thing
about these, the weight of them,

we can actually mound them up,

so the prop boys came up
with this great idea of wedges

and then building them up,

so it's total carnage
and devastation, really.

It looks great.

I've got to say, they work
really, really, well.

The prop guys
will never wanna see

another one
of these disks again,

because they spent a hell
of a lot of their time

walking them around, moving them
from the right flank.

Okay, now we've gotta dress
the left flank.

So, all the bodies have to
move across to the left flank.

Fucking hell!

For close up stuff,
interspersed with that,

would be live people
dressed as dead bodies.

When you walk on set sometimes,
and they're about to shoot,

suddenly one of them will twitch
or sort of move or something

and it's like, "Oh, my God!"
because that's actually an extra

who's been dressed
as a dead body.

And will sort of be in there
amongst the ones we put in.

Yeah, it's very disconcerting.

It's a strange place to be.

The last third of the movie

where we move
into an action film,

Jon realizes that the real task
still at hand

is to, essentially,
protect Bran.

- Bran!
- Go!

And so, he heads into
Winterfell and we follow him on a journey.

We've used Automus Maxima,

it's a handheld device

either the camera operator
or the grip can carry it,

and then one
of the camera operators

will operate it remotely.
You know, it's like...

It's like a remote control
steady cam, really.

It's very clever.

The camera flows through
the castle,

and stays with the character.
I think the audience

is gonna feel like
they're traveling with them,

and right up front with them.

That was the real kind of heart
of, I think, that episode,

is that long sequence with all
those different characters.

We needed Jon to make
his way through the courtyard,

and bear witness to all of the characters
that we know and we care about,

that he knows and he cares
about, being overwhelmed.

What we essentially did is
we took each group of people

and gave them all a fight,
and they learn the fight,

and we shot the fight,
and we use little pieces of it.

They were all losing battles.

I got to do,
like, a flippy move.

Got to fling my spear,
like, around my head,

I like doing that stuff.
A bit of flair.

I loved,
loved, filming the sequence

where we are really up
against it

and it is overwhelming
for Brienne,

and Brienne is in battle mode.

It was really all-encompassing
that night.

Being there was so intimidating
and so, you know,

we were all really panicked
by how claustrophobic it was,

and I think that really adds
to the work.

One of my highlights
from that episode is standing

on the pile of bodies
and fighting for my life.

And the funny thing was that
we said to the stunt guys,

if you manage to get me down,
take me down,

so on some takes, I died...
...or Tormund died.

I was really fighting
for my life.

Kristofer's life.

Strong arms, that.

One of the shots
that I really love there

is Jon looks over at his best...
Sees his best friend

being attacked
by all these wights,

and in any other circumstance,
Jon would, of course, rush over

to try to help Samwell.

It was great,
because it was this idea of...

Sam being one person
Jon has always gone back for,

has always relied on,
has always been his true friend,

and he had to sacrifice him
to go after the Night King,

and then it was finalized
with a moment where...

at some point, we just ran out
of stunt guys to throw at Sam,

and so he sat there, and he just
started crying and it was great,

because it truly was crying
amidst all this violence.

So seeing John do that
with Sam,

I thought it was really,
really great.

Again, he felt true
to the character.

If you're involved
in a battle scene,

you like to see yourself
as a fighter,

and you like to make it look
as good as you possibly can,

and Miguel was the one who has
to keep reigning me in and say,

"Remember, you're playing
Samwell Tarly,

and Samwell Tarly
is not a fighter."

The reason that Sam is in there
is because he's not a fighter,

and it's because he can show
how normal people would cope.

So we had to
really dial him down

and we just make it
in such a way

that we wouldn't allow him
to be cool.

We just put him
under so much pressure,

which is not fair to him
as a person,

because we could pr... We could
do it to everybody else too,

but we just don't. We made Kit
look really cool. We do.

You know, it's like...
All right,

what can we do to make Kit
look cooler?

So, one of the most
challenging shots

was when we traveled through
the courtyard extensively

and then we head down to what
we used to call the old kennels,

and as he's running down
this very long, dark corridor,

we had to coordinate
about 15 stuntmen

dropping out of the roof
around him.

They're obviously going
to arrive in a certain zone,

certain moment, certain second.

Which...
between the stunt guys and Kit,

they had to
coordinate perfectly.

...against the wall.
Now put it on his neck,

and then drag it out.

But take your time.
I wouldn't kill him...

I wouldn't kill him
until you see the next guy.

And everything was really
based around the idea of, like,

how can we make it feel
as messy as possible?

Well, then we had to
obviously put

one of our stabilized
handheld rigs behind him,

and still stay
really close to him

to make the audience
feel that jeopardy,

the danger
of what was happening.

After we've choreographed it
and rehearsed it, what have you,

and when we're shooting it,
my job is the safety of it

and making sure it all works.

Then I'm queuing,
because, obviously,

we all need to be in sync.

- Now!
- Good!

That was probably
one of the greatest challenges,

just to be in the right time
and right place.

And it had to be in, you know,
fractions of seconds to do it.

And the camera did
a 180 around him

at one point
during all this chaos.

Um... And we run backwards
at that point

until the great big
steel door is...

on... on railings is shot

right in front of these guys
near the last second.

And it feels like Jon Snow's
just got through there,

as has just... the camera's
just got through as well.

So, yeah. It's a very cool shot.

Go, go, go, go, go!

That's gotta be it.

Just 'cause we fancy
making you do it again.

But ultimately,
the key thing there

was to give Kit
the fight of his life

and then, at the end of it,
present him with

a... insurmountable odd,
which is...

a dead dragon.

Or an undead one.
Or not-dead.

The zombie dragon lands,

having his face been torn off,
can't exactly see,

smashes through the ravenry.
Just an insane fight where

Jon is ducking
behind these pieces of set

as this icy blue fire
is blasting over the top of him.

But the fun thing is
that Viserion is so damaged

by this point, he already has
a hole through his neck

from being taken down
by the Night King.

Now he's missing half his face,
so he's leaking.

So, you know, this blue fire

is kind of leaking
and shooting around.

There's fire blasting
all over the place,

which we shoot photographically,
for real,

using
a 3D motion control camera,

blasting fire
in a darkened stage.

We actually did
laser cuts for Viserion

from the digital model
of those openings.

And then bronze casts were made
and then fitted

by Sam Conway and his team
with fire jets.

And then that was put onto
this robot with a quick arm

so that the fire
would leak out of openings

that were accurate
to the dragon.

And there were so many
moving parts in this scene,

because you've got
the environment he's living in,

which is partially
the courtyard dressed

and largely virtual

because of the destruction
that's needed to be created.

And there's shooting Kit
in the set piece,

so that he's got something
to really duck behind

and have interactive lighting
wrap around him.

Fire!

We did a lot of
destruction in that courtyard.

We like building things,
but equally,

we like destroying things.
That's always quite fun.

So we go at it
with flamethrowers, paint,

earth, mud, you name it,
we just...

take it in there and do whatever
it takes to destroy the thing.

I asked for a load of wood
to be removed.

We made a huge bonfire of it.

We burned it for about a day

until it's charcoaled,
it's almost destroyed.

Then actually, we get something
rather beautiful.

It's rather wonderful.

Just when you think
that it's all over,

just when you think that
Jon Snow's gonna be the hero,

again, we realize...

that Arya appears
through the mist.

I mean, you're like,
"Ooh, maybe I'll get him!

I'm not gonna get him."

And then you're reading,
you're like, "Ooh,

maybe Jon's gonna get him!

Wait, he's not gonna..."
And I remember

actually being like, "Whoa!"

And kind of applauding in my head,
and you know, "Yeah!"

And then in the read-through
when, like,

when Maisie was doing it,
and we were all just like

wooping and cheering.

Yeah, it's amazing.

I think Maisie
thought it was super cool.

She's like, "Yeah,
I'm gonna kill him."

Um... Kit
was really fine with it.

I was pissed.

I was pissed that it wasn't me
killing the Night King.

I could've... I would've sw...
I would've given you, like...

I'd have bet you thousands.

Before we read the finals,
I was like,

"Yeah, it's definitely me."

And then they lead you on,
Jon's chasing the Night King.

Jon Snow has always
been the hero,

the one who's been the savior,

but... it just didn't seem right
to us for this moment.

It's probably three years now,
or something, we've known

that it was gonna be Arya
who delivers that fatal blow.

Dan and David let me break
all the Game of Thrones rules

for that sequence.

Majority of it is shot
96 frames a second,

it's all super-slow motion,
it's all heightened reality,

which is not what
they usually do.

It's a surreal nightmare.

Finally, the Night King and Bran
are finding each other.

The music plays a big part
in creating

that sense of despair that
should exist in that moment.

And you're intercutting
with Jon,

who's clearly
not going to make it.

And you're intercutting
with all our other characters,

where they're just...
they're so fucked.

Everybody's fucked.

I mean, that was literally...
that was the phrase we kept using.

It's like, "Let's do
the "it's fucked" shot."

And then everyone
would shoot a shot

where it just feels like
there's no escape.

Everyone's going to die right now.
You know they're not,

but we want you to feel
that same feeling

of, "Oh, my God. It's...

We can't. What's the recovery?
How do we come back from this?"

And we've all forgotten about,
you know,

that little innocent girl
from all those years ago

who's turned into a trained killer,
who's coming out of nowhere.

'Cause essentially,
she does jump out of nowhere,

and that's a wire rig.

It's a wire rig we did on the location,
but the location wasn't ideal.

It was really hard
to get a crane in there,

and we've obviously got
the weirwood tree.

So it was tricky to do it there,

and we did a version of it there,
but then we had to redo it

because we didn't have the ability
to control it as much as we'd hoped.

And it needed to be a real
"boom, out of nowhere" moment

and a real... you know,
a locking together of these two characters.

Shooting that was tedious,
but...

so great to be able to perform
all these different beats

within maybe, like,
two seconds of footage.

We knew it had to be
Valyrian steel.

To the exact spot where
the Child of the Forest

put the dragonglass blade
to create the Night King.

And that weapon has been one of
the totemic pieces for us,

and ultimately, we've known
for a long, long time

that was gonna
end the Night King.

When Samwell's reading
the book about dragonglass

there is a picture
of the dagger.

The Targaryens used
dragonglass to decorate their weapons

without even knowing
what the First Men used it for.

It is very possible
that the same thing

that created the Night King

is the thing that was necessary
to destroy the Night King,

or maybe it's Valyrian steel,
or...

Figure it out for yourself.

Not gonna say.

I think that's such a...

nice little full-circle thing
as well,

that that's the knife
that was destined to kill Bran,

and here it is, saving him.

That's, like, an iconic moment.

You know, the fall of the dead.

It's exactly what you need.

Like, oh, yeah!

She, like, takes him down!

It's so good. It's so good.

It's perfect.

I think it's, uh,
it's an inspired move.

Um... You've always been waiting
as to what purpose...

Arya's assassin skills
were gonna lead to.

And it's for
the most important purpose.

Reading what I get to achieve

and Arya's whole purpose in this world
and everything she's trained for

comes down to this one episode.

It's just amazing.

And it's just... it's beautiful.
It's poetry.

And I'm grateful that
it was me and not Kit.

Think about Jorah.
From the first time we met him,

he was with Dany, you know.

And the first time you meet him
is at Dany's wedding,

when he's giving her
the books of Westerosi history.

And from that time, he's been
mostly by her side.

If Jorah could have chosen
a way to die,

it would have been
protecting Dany.

There was a lot
of input from Iain

and from Emilia about

making sure their characters
stayed true to who they were.

Not having Jorah
lose sight of his goal,

which is protect his queen
at all costs.

Emilia didn't want to be
completely damsel-in-distress.

My hero.

She didn't feel
that her character

would be like that.
But then, we didn't...

we've never seen her
do anything in that vein,

so we needed to make her
not look like

she was completely ineffective
and disinterested

in saving Jorah.

And then you don't care
what happens to...

No, that's why I'm trying
to play up the "Waaah."

But also, this was
Iain's big moment.

We realized that
all he ever wanted to do

was to serve her.
And all he ever wanted to do

was to... was to fight
to protect her

and there'd never been a moment
where she more needed

someone to fight to protect her
than this moment.

And Iain himself, I think, was...

I think he was happy
to go down fighting,

'cause he's very good at it.

My favorite scene to shoot
was my demise.

Yeah. Yeah.

Just... just because
it required most of me.

It was the most demanding
and the most fulfilling scene.

And it felt the right conclusion
for Jorah's role.

And being given a good setting,

a very kind of dramatic
and telling setting.

Incredible performance from Iain

and also from Emilia
at the very end there

as she's holding him
in her arms, and just that...

you know, it's really hard
to fake that kind of...

of pure grief.

And Emilia just really
broadened those moments.

I think part of it was 'cause
she's such a good actress,

but I think part of it
is because

she and Iain
had been working together

for so, so long and have become
very, very close,

and they've had
so many scenes together,

and it's all coming to an end,
you know.

Both their characters'
relationship on the show,

but also, our time together
working on the show.

It was really hard.

You know,
I just had to look at Iain's...

face, and it was like...

it's all there, it's all... that's our
relationship, it's like, the whole...

You know, we've been
with these characters

for so many years.

We've been, like,
to hell and back with them.

It's been, uh, it's been...

It's been quite a journey.

Can't find the words.

You know? It's just...

great fun and, uh...

yeah.

I'm so really,
very, very chuffed

to be a part of the whole
mad, wonderful thing of it all.