We’re now in week two of Game of Thrones season 7, and since the season began fans have spotted a crucial change in the opening credits. Early seasons of the show portrayed a fairly unchanged map of Westeros, with the famous Wall in the north surrounded on both sides by sea. In the below picture from an old season, the Wall forms an unbroken line across the northern part of Westeros: there’s no way around it, and Westeros is safe from the Night King.
As we saw in the show’s Hardhome episode from season 5, the White Walkers don’t like water – there’s proof in the clip below – and with the Wall intact there’s no way for them to reach the south. Until now, that is. If you’ve been watching the opening sequence of season 7 carefully, you’ll have noticed a crucial change on the east side of the wall.
If you look at the opening sequence of the new season, you’ll notice that the sea to the east of the wall looks… different. It’s frozen over. And that means something terrible could be about to happen.
In the first episode of season 7, the Hound had a vision in the flames: “Ice. A wall of ice. The Wall. Where the Wall meets the sea, there’s a castle there. There’s a mountain. Looks like an arrowhead. The dead are marching past. Thousands of them.” You may remember that Tormund said he was heading to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea with his army of Wildlings – and the Hound seems to be on his way there with Thoros of Myr and Beric Dondarrion, too. Some kind of showdown is inevitable, and fans have pinpointed a moment in the series trailer that looks very like the scene the Hound is describing.
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What do you reckon? Are the White Walkers going to come around the Wall? Let us know your take in the comments.