Game Of Thrones Episodes You Need To Watch Before The Final Season

What better way to start than with the pilot? In "Winter is Coming," audiences are introduced to the honor-driven and high-born Stark family, led by patriarch Ned Stark (Sean Bean), a just lord who rules the North faction of Westeros with a steady hand (and as it happens, "winter is coming" is the house's motto). Surrounded by his family, including his apparent bastard son Jon Snow (Kit Harington), Ned gets inadvertently involved in a political scheme after hearing that the Hand of the King has died, also fielding a visit from the royal family.

Beyond that, his children all get their own direwolves after finding a litter in the forest; viewers meet a young and meek Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) just before her arranged marriage; and the episode closes with Bran Stark (Isaac Hempstead-Wright) being pushed out of a window after accidentally discovering an incestuous royal relationship between Cersei and her twin Jaime (Lena Headey and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau). Pair that with a (literal) cold open featuring the first glimpse of a White Walker, and you've got quite the start to the series.

Even though Thrones is now known for its intense, high-budget battles, season 2 brought the first big skirmish with "Blackwater," which chronicled an invasion by the Baratheon army led by Stannis (Stephen Dillane), the brother of the late King Robert and apparent heir to the Iron Throne, against King's Landing. Tyrion saves the city and its entire population by utilizing "wildfire," a potentially magical and extremely flammable substance, against the invading forces, but is nearly assassinated by a member of his own army, saved only by the bravery of his loyal squire Podrick Payne (Daniel Portman). Tyrion, now permanently scarred and unrecognized as the savior of the capital, knows his life is at risk on and off the battlefield.

During the battle, we also see the best and worst sides of other characters (but mainly the worst) — Joffrey, who lays claim to the victory, spends most of the battle hiding in fear, while an extremely drunk Cersei, after emotionally tormenting a terrified Sansa, carries her youngest son, Tommen, to the Iron Throne and is poised to poison them both until her father, Tywin Lannister (Charles Dance), arrives and announces victory. It's a low point for some of the Lannisters, but as usual, they somehow come out on top.

Faithful readers of A Song of Ice and Fire, the series on which Thrones is based, knew the Red Wedding was coming, but it didn't make watching it any easier. After going back on a promise to marry one of Walder Frey's (David Bradley) daughters, Robb Stark (Richard Madden) was in the vengeful old man's crosshairs, but Walder pretended he would accept Robb's uncle as a son-in-law instead. After inviting Robb, his mother Catelyn (Michelle Fairley), and his pregnant wife Talisa (Oona Chaplin) to the festivities, Walter orchestrated the brutal slaughter the Stark faction during the reception with the help of the traitorous Bolton clan.

Whether or not you've seen the episode before, the feeling of dread that intensifies once the doors lock behind the Starks and the opening strains of the titular song, "The Rains of Castamere" (which itself describes a massacre) is undeniable. Despite being one of the hardest episodes of the show to watch, it's necessary — both to understand the turmoil in Westeros and to understand how far the show will go to intensify the plot.

Thanks to the Purple Wedding, Tyrion spends the rest of the fourth season wrongfully imprisoned for Joffrey's murder, and after a harrowing trial where everyone he's ever met (including his wronged lover) testifies to his guilt, Tyrion returns to a tactic he successfully employed once before — demanding a trial by combat. (Though Tyrion's testimony happens two episodes before, it is definitely worth watching.) At first, nobody volunteers to be Tyrion's champion and face down the Mountain, a terrifying and gigantic fighter representing Tyrion's conniving sister Cersei, but eventually, Oberyn Martell (Pedro Pascal), whose sister was raped and killed by the Mountain, offers his spear in Tyrion's defense.

Tyrion's first trial by combat ended well for him, so the audience may have expected it to work out a second time, but let's not forget what Game of Thrones is all about. After felling the Mountain with a poisoned spear, it seems like Oberyn has won, until his hubris gets the best of him and the Mountain knocks him down mid-taunt and squashes Oberyn's head like a bug in one of the show's most gruesome sequences to date. With Tyrion's fate now officially in question, audiences waited anxiously to see how he could get out of this one (which, eventually, he does).

As season 5 ended, so did the series' source material — with A Dance of Dragons, the sixth book in A Song of Ice and Fire, still unreleased, putting plenty of pressure on showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss to shake things up in a big way in order to set up completely uncharted territory in the sixth season. An Emmy winner for both writing and directing, this season finale provided plenty of action, including Theon (Alfie Allen) and Sansa's escape from the Ramsay Bolton-run Winterfell, the death of Myrcella Baratheon, Stannis' defeat, and Arya's first check mark on her kill list and subsequent punishment, but two characters, Cersei and Jon Snow, ultimately take center stage.

After confessing to her crimes, Cersei faces her punishment at the hands of the High Sparrow, and in a now infamous "walk of shame," she is forced to walk through the streets of King's Landing naked with her hair shorn as her people assault her. Cersei might have it pretty bad in this episode, but she can't top Jon's problems, which culminate in his assassination at the hands of his own men in the Night's Watch. Leaving audiences to wonder about Jon's fate for a year (and frequently lying about it) seems like a pretty harsh move, but the Thrones showrunners aren't often known for their generosity.

Another Emmy winner for writing and directing, season 6's "Battle of the Bastards" provided fans with yet another hotly anticipated moment — specifically, the showdown between Ramsay Bolton and Jon Snow over control of Winterfell, as well as to defend the Stark family's name and honor against the savage Bolton clan. Not content with one battle, the episode opens with a staggering assault by Daenerys on the slave masters of Mereen as she burns their ships to a crisp, but quickly turns its attention back to Winterfell, where Jon is waging his own war against Ramsay.

After Jon refuses to hand over Sansa and Rickon, the youngest Stark, dies at Ramsay's hands, the battle finally begins, and with Jon in several life-threatening situations amidst a dwindling force of Stark bannermen, all seems lost, until Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish (Aidan Gillen) arrives with his own forces at Sansa's behest. Once Ramsay and Jon end up in direct hand-to-hand combat, Ramsay's smugness can't overcome Jon's sheer fury, and the Bolton bastard ends up beaten to a pulp, eventually meeting a gruesome end when Sansa turns his own starving hounds on him. From Ramsay's death to the unfurling of Stark banners on the walls of Winterfell, "Battle of the Bastards" is a rare satisfying episode of Thrones, and remains a fan favorite.  

Though many critics found Thrones' seventh season to be somewhat uneven, there's no denying that it ended with a bang, thanks to a long-suspected reveal about Jon Snow's real parentage. Besides Sansa and Arya coming together and Cersei and Daenerys attempting (and failing) to form some sort of legitimate negotiation concerning the White Walkers, Bran and Sam Tarly (John Bradley) discover that Jon is not actually the bastard son of Ned Stark, but the product of a loving relationship and secret marriage between Lyanna Stark, Ned's late sister, and Rhaegar Targaryen, Daenerys' brother and the true heir to the throne. Since this makes Jon Daenerys' nephew, as well as her biggest rival where the Iron Throne is concerned, it's especially awkward that the episode relays this revelation over Daenerys and Jon's first night together.

Jon's real identity as Aegon Targaryen will certainly carry plenty of weight in season 8, but the most important moment of the season 7 finale is still the destruction of the Wall, which audiences previously thought couldn't be felled by any force. Thanks to his new ice dragon (which he gained thanks to an ill-advised mission by Daenerys, Jon, and their forces to the far North), the Night's King is able to crumble entire sections of the Wall, setting up the real war to come that reaches far beyond the Iron Throne.