'Game of Thrones' director finally reveals what the Night King's ice dragon breathes

The Game of Thrones season finale answered a lot of questions – who will win out in the power struggle at Winterfell? (The Stark sisters.) Will staring into the eyes of a terrifying wight convince Cersei to call her bannermen and join the fight against the Army of the Dead? (No, of course not, it’s Cersei.) And is The Hound still the grumpiest, sweariest bastard in Westeros? (Does a bear defecate rurally?)

But where it answered questions, it also asked them – most notably at the very end of the episode, as we saw the Night King, sat atop the undead Viserion’s back, blasting a huge hole through the Wall using… what? Fire? Ice? Magic? No one was really sure.

Fans had been speculating about what the ice dragon might breathe since the Night King turned him at the end of Episode 6, and the finale didn’t really clear it up. So thankfully, the episode’s director, Jeremy Podeswa, has revealed all for us.

Speaking to HuffPost, he said: “The way I looked at it was, when the Sept burned down, that was green fire, and so then the dragon is going to have some kind of blueish fire. It’s certainly still fire — it has the ability to burn the Wall and melt snow. But it’s going to have a different kind of magical quality to it, because it’s coming from an undead dragon.”

So there you go, it’s still fire, but magic fire – this must be why it was able to bring down the Wall. The Wall is made of more than just ice and rock, it was also instilled with magical properties, so it would make sense that it would take some kind of destructive magic to make it crumble.

Ice dragons also exist in George R. R. Martin’s books, or at least they may have done in the past. However, they probably aren’t the same thing we’re seeing in the show, and probably weren’t anything to do with the White Walkers.

On ice dragons, Martin writes: "[The] colossal beasts, many times larger than the dragons of Valyria, are said to be made of living ice, with eyes of pale blue crystal and vast translucent wings through which the moon and stars can be glimpsed as they wheel across the sky.

“Whereas common dragons (if any dragon can truly be said to be common) breathe flame, ice dragons supposedly breathe cold, a chill so terrible that it can freeze a man solid in half a heartbeat [...] As ice dragons supposedly melt when slain, no actual proof of their existence has ever been found."

Another question that has been on everyone’s lips for a few weeks now, thanks to a theory that’s been flying around the internet: could Bran Stark really be the Night King?

Well, speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Bran’s actor, Isaac Hempstead-Wright, has had his say: "I don't know. I think it's a little bit far-fetched. But the whole Hodor thing, if I had read that as a theory, I would have said, ‘Nah, this is crazy.’ So, who knows?

“Although I have to say, people are now comparing my face to the Night King and going, ‘Yeah! It's him! It's over, there's no question about it!’ And I'm like, ‘I don't look that much like the Night King, do I?’”

Good news: the next season should give us answers to everything, as it’s the last one. Bad news: we might have to wait up to two years to see it. Bleugh.

(Images: HBO)