New character confirmed for 'Game of Thrones' Season 8 hints the Freys might not be totally dead

Spoilers ahead for Game of Thrones Season 7 - you have been warned!

There are many hated houses in the Game of Thrones universe; the Boltons, the Greyjoys, the Lannisters. And then there’s one family that’s perhaps more despised than all of them: the Freys. Led by the late Walder Frey (played to perfection by David Bradley), the Freys were responsible for the Red Wedding – perhaps the most shocking and bloody scene in the show’s history.

Viewers around the world let out a collective cheer when Arya avenged her family by serving up some delicious ‘Frey pie’ and then stabbing the lecherous Walder Frey in the neck at the end of Season 6:

Then, in the opening scene of last season, she killed off the rest of the wretched family via a mass poisoning:

Importantly, Arya left a couple of female characters alive and told one of them: “When people ask you what happened here, tell them the North remembers. Tell them winter came for House Frey.”

Now, fan site Watchers on the Wall has discovered that Irish actress Danielle Galligan has been cast to play a character called Sarra in the show’s final season. Her online CV shows she will star in an upcoming episode directed by David Nutter:

The only known reference to a Sarra in the A Song of Ice and Fire book series is Sarra Frey – one of Walder Frey’s granddaughters. Along with her twin sister Serra, the pair are described as pimply and generally unattractive. And when Robb Stark arrived at The Twins for his uncle Edmure’s wedding, he had the option of marrying Sarra, but turned it down.

So the fact that Arya left one or two Freys alive – and this latest casting announcement – both suggest that House Frey could be making a comeback.

In fact, according to her online CV, Galligan boasts that she is trained in the use of rapiers and daggers – both skills that could come in handy if she’s going to face off against Arya. And it might even turn out that the young Frey she spoke to at the family massacre was Sarra.

Actress Danielle Galligan was trained at The Lir Academy in Trinity College, Dublin, before graduating in 2015. She has since appeared in a number of film, TV and theatre productions. 

Game of Thrones’ eighth and final season is expected to return to television at some point in 2019, so we’ve got quite a wait to find out if all this House Frey speculation turns out to be accurate. But thankfully we’ve been promised that up to five spin-off series are currently in the works. 

ShortList has contacted HBO for comment.

(Image: HBO)