After last night’s Season 6 premiere of Game of Thrones, HBO released a brief preview for next week’s episode “Home”, airing Sunday, May 1 at 9 PM ET. This video gave us a new look at the returning character Bran Stark (Isaac Hempstead Wright), who sat out all of Season 5 because his story had caught up with the George R.R. Martin books. While we’ll have to wait and see if the network shows more footage before Sunday night, HBO has released the official synopses for both “Home” and the third episode of Season 6, “Oathbreaker”, airing May 8.
HBO‘s description for “Home” reveals that Bran trains with the Three-Eyed Raven (Max von Sydow) while, in King’s Landing, Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) advises Tommen (Dean-Charles Chapman). Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) demands good news, but has to make his own. At Castle Black, the Night’s Watch stands behind Thorne (Owen Teale). Ramsay Bolton (Iwan Rheon) proposes a plan, and Balon Greyjoy (Patrick Malahide) entertains other proposals.
The preview released last night revealed that King Tommen has ordered a group of soldiers to prohibit his mother Cersei (Lena Headey) from leaving, which could be why Jamie is “advising” King Tommen. Last night’s video also showed Ramsay proposing to attack Castle Black, which isn’t being defended on the Southern side. Ramsay wants to attack because he believes that Sansa (Sophie Turner) is heading to Castle Black, but we’re not quite sure where she’s actually heading yet, after Brienne (Gwendoline Christie) and Podrick (Daniel Portman) saved her and Theon (Alfie Allen) from Ramsay’s men.
The most intriguing aspect of the synopsis reveals that Balon Greyjoy, Theon Greyjoy’s father, is coming back, who we haven’t seen since the Season 3 finale, “Mhysa”. This isn’t terribly surprising, though, since we have already learned that Theon’s sister Yara (Gemma Whelan) is returning, while it has also been rumored that new cast member Pilou Asbeak is playing Theon’s uncle, Euron Greyjoy. It has been rumored that this season will feature a Kingsmoot, a ceremony in the Iron Islands to decide who the new ruler will be.
In the May 8 episode entitled “Oathbreaker”, Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) meets her future, while Bran meets the past. Tommen confronts the High Sparrow (Jonathan Pryce) and Arya (Maisie Williams) trains to be No One. Varys (Conleth Hill) finds an answer, while Ramsay gets a gift. The mention of Bran meeting the past could refer to his unique ability known as greensight, which he has been training to hone with the Three Eyed Raven. In the George R.R. Martin novels, greensight allows one to see the past, present and future, but we’ll have to wait and see how Bran Stark uses this unique gift. Stay tuned for more on Game of Thrones Season 6 as anticipation builds for next week’s episode.