SPOILER ALERT: Stop reading if you still need to catch up with Season 6 and don’t want to know any revelations from its final episodes or you don’t want to develop any preconceived ideas about Season 7.
For a series that’s delighted fans by regularly upsetting their expectations, “Game of Thrones” surprised them even more at the end of Season 6 by confirming a beloved fan theory regarding Jon Snow’s origins.
In the final episode, the show revealed the true identity of Jon’s parents, via a vision experienced by his younger half-brother Bran Stark – who, it turns out, isn’t really his half brother but his cousin. HBO also gave away the identities of Jon’s parents via an infographic it released last year.
As fans have long suspected, Jon Snow (Kit Harrington) isn’t the bastard son of Ned Stark, the noble lord of Winterfell. Rather, he’s the product of the scandalous union between Ned’s sister Lyanna and Rhaegar Targaryen, the late crown prince of the Iron Throne.
This fan theory has been known by the equation R+L=J. Under the theory, Rhaegar forsook his wife to kidnap Lyanna and mate with her, setting off the civil war that ended Targaryen rule over the Seven Kingdoms and set the whole “Game of Thrones” story into motion.
Jon, of course, doesn’t yet know about Bran’s vision because Jon and Bran haven’t been in the same location since early in Season 1.
Season 7, premiering July 16, will likely have major plot points revolving around how and when the newly declared King of the North will learn the truth about his parentage and how this information affects his personal fortunes and his fight to save Westeros from the White Walkers.
While it’s hard to predict how those plot points will unfold, here are things to keep in mind:
Jon now has a legitimate claim to the Iron Throne: Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) and Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) are the chief rivals for the Iron Throne, with Cersei currently having the upper hand because she currently sits on it. But her legitimacy is questionable because 1.) she’s not a Targaryen, 2.) she’s female and 3.) she only earned the crown after she murdered her husband, King Robert, survived the deaths of her three children, two of whom were king, and eliminated key enemies by blowing up much of King’s Landing.
Daenerys’s claim is pretty indisputable. The Mother of Dragons is the only surviving child of King Aerys II, the “Mad King” and Rhaegar’s father. But Jon’s claim is even technically stronger than Dany’s. Not only is he also a direct-line descendent of Aerys, he’s male. The Targaryen rules of succession prefer male rulers.
It’s debatable how much Jon would want to rule the Seven Kingdoms. While a natural leader, he has acted as though power were a burden when he was Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch and now as King of the North. Maybe he’d prefer letting someone else rule over the Seven Kingdoms, someone like Dany who really wants it.
Expect Daenerys and Jon to team up: In the second official trailer for Season 7, we see Dany walking on a beach, presumably at Dragonstone, the Targaryens’ ancestral home. We also see a shot of her three dragons flying over Dragonstone, followed by several brief shots of Daenerys’ new allies: Tyrion Lannister, Theon Greyjoy and Unsullied commander Grey Worm.
We hear Jon in voice-over say, “For centuries our families fought together against their common enemy, despite their differences. Together. We need to do the same if we’re going to surive because the enemy is real.”
It sounds like he’s talking to Dany, though other fans say this could have come from a speech he gave to other northern lords to help in previous battles. Titles and descriptions for the first three episodes say that Dany will be receiving an unexpected visitor on Episode 2, and one breakdown of the second trailer argues that it will be Jon himself – with Davos Seaworth tagging along.
In any case, Jon’s speech applies to new and pressing concerns, in which he explaining that the real battle isn’t over who sits on the Iron Throne but on how everyone needs to work together to eliminate the real threat to the world posed by the White Walkers.
But how much are they going to team up?: Some fans speculate that Jon and Dany will become romantically involved.
But wait! We now know they are related. As the younger sister of Prince Rhaegar, Dany is Jon’s aunt; he’s her nephew. Sure, neither “Game of Thrones” nor the Targaryens has ever shied away from incest, but this could be too much. Let’s hope they just become good friends.
And if Jon throws his support behind Dany’s bid to become queen, there’s a good chance they could become really good friends.
Is Jon the “prince that was promised?”: George R.R. Martin’s planned seven-book saga is formally known as “A Song of Ice and Fire.”
Ice is for White Walkers and anything related to the north, while fire is for dragons. Coming from both the Stark and Targaryen gene pool, Jon therefore is half ice, half fire.
The title also relates to an ancient prophesy that a savior, the so-called “prince that was promised” would emerge at some point to combat an “impending darkness” threatening all of civilization. This prince would be armed with a flaming sword, Lightbringer. Over the series, several possible prince candidates have emerged, including Stannis Baratheon and Dany. But Stannis is dead. As for Dany, it’s uncertain whether the prince prophesy is specific about gender.
One of the clues that points to Jon comes from one of the books, according to Vulture writer Nate Jones. It describes a vision Dany had of her brother Rhaegar saying the song of this promised prince is “the song of ice and fire.” That sounds a lot like Jon.
Jon can now ride dragons: The trailers show Dany’s three dragons swooping in to help their mother in battle take the Iron Throne. It’s also been strongly suggested that only those with Targaryen blood can ride dragons. If Dany and Jon team up, she might be inclined to let Jon take one out for a spin.
Of course, this leaves open the question of who will ride the third dragon and who else among the main characters left possesses Targaryen blood? That’s a fan theory for another day, but let’s just say it has its own equation: A+J=T.
Look for a Stark family reunion – but maybe not a happy one: Jon and Sansa (Sophie Turner) have already returned together to Winterfell – though, of course, they don’t know yet that they are only cousins. Their reunion, by the way, is expected to be increasingly fraught with tension, with the scheming Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish (Aidan Gillen) trying to poison their relationship, Entertainment Weekly has reported. Baelish seems intent on pushing Sansa to seize power for herself, so he can rule by her side.
Meanwhile, Season 7 trailers make it look like the other Stark siblings, Arya (Maisie Williams) and Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright) will be showing up soon at the old family home.
Bran can then fill everyone in about who Jon really is. But how Jon would take such news is anyone’s guess.
He might suffer another identity crisis – not being a bastard anymore – and do some more sulking. But he’ll have to pull himself out of his funk quickly enough. As the likely “prince that was promised,” he needs to hurry up and save civilization.