The Intriguing Reality of White Walkers and Wights in Game of Thrones Season 7 Episode 6

Understanding the Bond Between White Walkers and Wights

In Game of Thrones Season 7 Episode 6, each White Walker possesses the unique ability to raise and control the dead through wights. However, the connection between a White Walker and these creatures it controls is highly specific. When Jon Snow kills a White Walker, only the wights directly raised by that particular Walker are affected. This brings up an interesting question: why did the captured wight remain unaffected?

In-Story Explanation: The in-story reason suggests that the captured wight was likely raised by another White Walker or was unaffected due to the specific circumstances surrounding its reanimation. Out-of-Story Explanation: In the out-of-story world, the showrunners needed Jon and his team to capture one wight strategically. This event could be seen as a matter of being in the right place at the right time or as a matter of plot convenience.

This distinct distinction highlights the nature of control that White Walkers have over the wights they create, creating a layer of intrigue in the storyline.

The Mechanism of Control: White Walker and Wight Interaction

In one scene from S7E06, when Jon ambushes and kills the first White Walker, all the wights following him perish, except for the one they managed to capture. This raises another question: why did the captured wight not die?

From a lore perspective, the White Walker was warging all the wights that were with him. When a warg is killed while in control of another body, the warg's consciousness gets trapped in the body they were controlling. For instance, when Jon Snow killed the wildling Orell while he was warging his eagle, the eagle attacked Jon.

Similarly, the White Walker's consciousness was trapped in the last wight it was controlling when it was killed by Jon, thus allowing the captured wight to remain alive.

Behind-the-Scenes Considerations

The White Walker and wight dynamics explored in S7E06 are complex. It's possible that the producers were not fully aware of the intricate connection between White Walkers and the wights they reanimate at the time the plot was developed. Some wights might have fallen off screen, and others might not have been reanimated by the killed White Walker.

This blend of storytelling, in-lore explanations, and behind-the-scenes plot convenience makes Game of Thrones a rich and multifaceted narrative, challenging viewers to dissect and understand the intricate web of lore and character interactions.